Charles Blackman — Alice in Wonderland
“Charles Blackman is an Australian painter known for works that incorporate scenes from Alice in Wonderland such as his Feet Beneath the Table (1956). In both his Schoolgirl and Alice series, Blackman conveys narrative events from his character’s point of view, by using exaggerated angles and strong directional light. “The artist’s job is to discover new meaning in his life,” he has said. Born on August 12, 1928 in Sydney, Australia, Blackman was largely self-taught, and became an illustrator at the Sun newspaper before moving to Melbourne in the mid-1940s. Following the move, Blackman befriended fellow artists Joy Hester, John Perceval, and Laurence Hope, and gained the support of the art critic and patron John Reed. In 1959, Blackman collaborated with a number of figurative artists, including John Brack, Arthur Boyd, and Robert Dickerson to create The Antipodeans group, which railed against Australian artists adopting American Abstract Expressionism and other non-figurative styles. He went on to receive the Order of the British Empire and continues to live and work in Sydney, Australia. Today, the artist’s works are held in the collections of the National Gallery of Victoria in Melbourne, the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, and the Tate Gallery in London, among others.”
