A Poem of the Land

Four thoughts

1. Lived experience does not pass in front of me like a thing but I appropriate it to myself, and it appropriates itself according to its essence.

—Martin Heidegger

2. All authentic art is conceived at a sacred moment and nourished in a blessed hour; an inner impulse creates it, often without the artist being aware of it.

—Caspar David Friedrich

3. I must surrender myself to what surrounds me, unite myself with the clouds and rocks, in order to be what I am.

— Caspar David Friedrich

4. The solution of the problem of life is seen in the vanishing of the problem. (Is not this the reason why those who have found after a long period of doubt that the sense of life became clear to them have been unable to say what constituted that sense)

—Ludwig Wittgenstein

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Imants Tillers is one of Australia’s foremost contemporary painters. He has represented Australia at important international exhibitions such as the Sao Paulo Bienal (1975), Documenta 7 (1982), and the 42nd Venice Biennale (1986). Major solo surveys of Tillers’ work include Imants Tillers: works 1978 – 1988 at the Institute of Contemporary Arts, London (1988); Imants Tillers: 19301, at the National Art Gallery, Wellington (1989); Diaspora, National Art Museum, Riga, Latvia (1993); Diaspora in Context at the Pori Art Museum, Pori (1995); Towards Infinity: Works by Imants Tillers, Museum of Contemporary Art (MARCO) in Monterrey, Mexico (1999); Imants Tillers: one world many visions at the National Gallery of Australia, Canberra and most recently, Imants Tillers: The Long Poem at the Lawrence Wilson Art Gallery, Perth.

Tillers has been the recipient of numerous awards and commissions, such as the Osaka Triennale Prize (Gold in 1993, Bronze in 1996, and Silver in 2001), and the inaugural Beijing International Art Biennale Prize for Excellence (2003). Major commissions include the Federation Pavilion, Centennial Park (1985 – 87); the Founding Donors Painting, Museum of Contemporary Art, Sydney (1991), and two key sculptures for Sydney Olympic Park (2002). Tillers has been a trustee of the Art Gallery of New South Wales since 2001. In 2005 he was awarded a Doctor of Letters honoris causa for ‘his long and distinguished contribution to the field of arts’, by the University of New South Wales.

Major monographs on Tillers’ work include Imants Tillers: The Long Poem by John Barrett-Lennard (2009); Imants Tillers: one world many visions by Deborah Hart (2006) and The Postmodern Art of Imants Tillers: Appropriation en abyme, 1971 – 2001 by Graham Coulter-Smith (2002). Tillers’ work was recently highlighted in Tony Godfrey’s major survey publication, Painting Today, (Phaidon, 2009). A Poem of the Land is Imants Tillers’ second solo exhibition at Roslyn Oxley9 Gallery.