Couche par couche, couleur par couleur, il travaille, agglomre les surfaces jusqu trouver la texture parfaite.

Anthony White appartient au courant dabstraction gestuelle qui a pris naissance il y a une dizaine danne la Australias National Art School. A lre de la distanciation post-pop et post-moderne, cet univers ne jouit pas toujours de la visibilit quil mrite, mais pour Anthony, cela na aucune importance. Il nest pas artiste suivre les caprices de la mode et, plutt que de lignorer, il la fait disparatre sous un flot de couleurs. Au cours de deux annes passes New York, White a peint un ensemble duvres qui rvle une passion pour la forme, le mouvement et la couleur que lon trouve rarement chez des peintres de son ge. Archologue mettant au jour les strates dun monde ancien, il absorbe puis rvle le poids, la densit dune terre laisse aux forces de la nature ou faonne par lhomme. La sensation de mouvement qui parcourt son travail reflte lnergie avec laquelle il voyage en saisissant des instantans des lieux quil traverse. Si lon peut tre tent de classer White parmi les peintres abstraits, une observation plus prcise montre que cest en fait un raliste convaincu. Lorsquil peint leau de la Seine, il donne forme dans les moindres dtails la salet accumule par des sicles de pollution industrielle. Lorsquil visite le Bonheur des Dames, plutt que de succomber aux sirnes du romantisme parisien, il creuse et dcouvre la terre dure et crasseuse sur laquelle repose la vieille cit. Je suis fascin par la ncessit de prserver lme dans la peinture , dclare-t-il. On a prononc dinnombrables fois la mort de la peinture, mais la recherche de la forme travers lobservation et labstraction mobsde plus que jamais. La peinture est dsormais libre de toute exigence morale, illustrative ou religieuse, ce qui rend possible la rvlation de son essence mme. Laurat de nombreux prix parmi les plus prestigieux dAustralie, dont la Brett Whiteley Travelling Scholarship et la Churchie Emerging Artist Award, il a remport en 2007 la Marten Bequest Travelling Scholarship, qui lui a permis de sjourner New

Layer by layer, colour by colour, he builds them up, painstakingly constructing the surfaces until finding the perfect texture. Anthony White comes from the gestural abstractionist school of painting that emerged from Australias National Art School in the last decade. It is a realm that in the cool post-pop, postmodern years seemed to fade from sight, at least for a while. But for White this was never an issue. He was not an artist to be subsumed by the variables of fashion indeed, if anything fashionability was a thing to be ignored or, better yet, assailed by a wall of colour. After spending time painting in New York City over the past two years, White has brought together a body of work that reveals a passion for colour, form and movement rarely seen in a painter his age. The results are not unlike slices of the world uncovered by an archaeologist. He seems to absorb and then exhale the weight of the earth, both natural and man-made. The sense of movement in the works reflects his own restless energy as he travels the world, capturing slices of the environment in which he finds himself. While it is easy to describe White as an abstractionist he is arguably more a stringent realist. When he paints the Seine in Paris he gets down into the dirty detail of a river assailed by centuries of industrial development. When he visits Au Bonheur des dames, rather than paint a romantic Parisian street scene, he unearths the dirt and grit of the aged metropolis. I am fascinated by maintaining the spirit in painting, White has stated. Painting has been declared dead numerous times, but there is something in the finding of form through observation and abstraction which keeps me coming back for more. Now that painting has been freed from serving any moral, illustrative or religious purpose then the very essence of a painting could be revealed. A finalist in many of Australias most respected prizes and awards, including The Brett Whiteley Travelling Scholarship, The Churchie Emerging Artist Award and in 2007 he won The Marten Bequest Travelling Scholarship, which took him to New York. During 2009 White lived and worked in Paris at the Cit International des Arts as part of the Stor-

York. En 2009, il a vcu Paris, o il a travaill la Cit Internationale des Arts dans le cadre de la rsidence Storrier/Onslow offerte par les Amis de la National Art School. Aprs avoir expos chez COMODAA Londres, White va participer au Leipzig International Art Programme et organiser une exposition personnelle avec la galerie Iain Dawson Sydney. A propos de cet vnement, il dclare : Les uvres qui constituent cette exposition ont t ralises en rsidence au Storrier/Onslow Studio en Australie et la Cit Internationale Des Arts, grce laquelle jai pu vivre et peindre pendant trois mois Paris. Les surfaces architecturales de Paris sont marques par des sicles daccumulation de graffiti, daffiches, de salet et dhumanit. Mon travail puise dans cette matire et dans lphmre, le transitoire, lorganique et lancien. Ashley Crawford, Sydney, Australia, 2010

rier/Onslow Studio residency made possible by the Friends of the National Art School. As well as showing with COMODAA in London, White will participate in The Leipzig International Art Programme and hold a solo show with the Iain Dawson Gallery in Sydney. Of his Sydney show White says: The work in this exhibition was made in residence at Australias Storrier Onslow Studio, at the Cite Internationale Des Arts, Paris. This studio award enabled me to paint and live in Paris for three months, he says. The architectural surfaces of Paris are laden with centuries of graffiti, posters, filth and humanity. The works draw upon these references and the sense of transience, the passing of time, the organic and the antique. Ashley Crawford Sydney, Australia, 2010