Ben Quilty

What, in the end, are these paintings? What are they attempting to achieve? My best but wholly provisional answer is that theyʼre experiments in the transfer of feeling…

The painter who stood where we stand now is proffering a model of feeling – they are saying that, on this day and under these circumstances, this is how they wrangled the world. And as fellow ʼfeelersʼ approaching the work, we get to measure ourselves against that model. Is it useful? Can we see what they mean? And if not, is the difference illuminating? It is not about ʼlikingʼ or feeling liked back. It is about being compelled. Quilty compels through paintings that are, as we are, alive and conflicted.

– Justin Paton, Head curator international, Art Gallery NSW, essay quote from the book Ben Quilty (2019).

Download the Ben Quilty The Beach (2021) essay.

Download the Ben Quilty 150 Years (2020) essay.

Read more at The Age (February 2020) and an interview with Ben Quilty from the National Gallery of Victoria magazine (July 2020) on the 150 year, Rorschach painting.

Watch Ben Quilty in the studio talking about the painting, 2020.

Read Ben Quilty ‘SHADOWED’ (2023) essay by Milena Stojanovska.

Read War artist Ben Quilty on painting children, ‘the victims of our collective adult insanity’, The Age  (February 2024) by Kerry O’Brien

DOWNLOAD PROFILE / CV
Ben Quilty ‘Sonny’ installation view, 17 February – 20 April 2024
Ben Quilty ‘Sonny’ installation view, 17 February – 20 April 2024
Ben Quilty ‘Sonny’ installation view, 17 February – 20 April 2024, (Left) Gayth Al-Thabet (8 years) / Drew a tank and a screaming mother because her son died and a bird escaping and an aircraft throwing missiles. (right)Mohammad Khalaf (8 years) / Airplane bombing and father carrying his son who dies on their floor and bird in the sky
Ben Quilty ‘Sonny’ installation view, 17 February – 20 April 2024, (left) Abdallah Al Ahmad (11 years) / There was a war in my country. This picture is of me and my family leaving Syria going to Labanon. It was scary because there were soldiers killing people in front of my house. (right) Ahmad Al Ahmed (9 years) / My family and aunties are hiding in our house under the floor from the bad guys outside. Someone outside got killed.
Ben Quilty ‘Sonny’ installation view, 17 February – 20 April 2024, Mohammad Hajar (11 years) / This drawing is about Syria before and after the war. In the before picture there are a lot of people playing and working. In the after picture there are people being killed, children crying and no one could help.