Melodrama in Meiji Japan: The NLA Clough collection of woodblock printed frontispieces (kuchi-e)

Recent scholarship of the Japanese print has brought renewed interest in the woodblock-printed frontispieces (kuchi-e) produced for novels and literary magazines of the Meiji period (1868-1912). They are interesting not only in their role as illustrations in emerging genres of Japanese literary fiction, but also due to their artistic merit, with many printed to a high standard. They provide insight into the changing trends in Japanese woodblock-printed imagery and in the art world during the Meiji era.

Between 2001 and 2014, retired Sydney academic Professor Richard Clough donated over 500 kuchi-e to the Library. The collection dates from the late 1890s to the 1920s, and comprises works by over twenty-seven artists. This, together with the range and subjects of kuchi-e in the collection, offers a representative sampling of the entire woodblock-printed kuchi-e tradition.

This talk introduces the Clough collection, alongside recent scholarship on kuchi-e profiled in the Library's exhibition Melodrama in Meiji Japan.

The speaker, Gary Hickey, is a curator and scholar of Japanese art. He sits on the directorial board of the Tokyo-based International Ukiyo-e Society.

Driven by the sheer scale of losses in 1914, and concerned about how war graves were marked, recorded and cared for, Fabian Ware conceived of and petitioned for the creation of the Imperial War Graves Commission. Major-General Paul Stevens reflects on the continued commemoration of those who died in war.

 

In association with the Canberra Great War Study group, the Estaminet.

Judith Wright (1915-2000) remains a giant figure within Australian art, culture and politics. Her 1946 collection of poetry, The Moving Image, revolutionised the genre in Australia. She helped establish the modern Australian environmental movement and was a key player in early campaigns for Aboriginal land rights.

Drawing on the Library’s extensive collection of Judith Wright’s papers, Professor Tom Griffiths and Dr Georgina Arnott reflect on her status as a historian, exploring what can be learnt from her life’s work.

The Unmourned, a murder mystery set in convict Australia, is a brilliant collaboration by Australian author Tom Keneally and his eldest daughter Meg. Hear more about their creative partnership and the gripping historical crime series, Monsarrat. 

In association with Penguin Random House

On 11 April 1917, an Australian Division made an unsuccessful attack on the formidable German Hindenburg Line defences near Bullecourt in France. It resulted in over 3,000 casualties, 1,200 of whom were taken prisoner. Bullecourt represented the largest capture of Australian prisoners in a single action of the First World War, yet the experiences of these captured men remains little known. Historian Aaron Pegram explores their ordeal in German captivity.

In association with the Canberra Great War Study Group, the Estaminet.

Between 1945 and 1970, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander performers created new dynamic performances that took Indigenous music and dance traditions onto the performance stage.

Audiences in Sydney and Melbourne enthusiastically received groups such as the Aboriginal Theatre, created by artists from Arnhem Land, the Tiwi Islands, and Roper and Daly rivers. At the same time, non-Indigenous Australian composers and choreographers were creating hybrid works that drew on barely understood Aboriginal story, music, and dance traditions, yet reached large audiences and attracted considerable support from the Arts Council of Australia, the ABC, and the Australian Elizabethan Trust.

Using manuscripts, music, dance, and ephemera materials, Dr Amanda Harris has examined these touring performances as diverse expressions of Australian cultural identity.

Dr Amanda Harris is a musicologist and cultural historian at the University of Sydney. Her research explores intersections of Indigenous and non-Indigenous identities in Australian music and dance after the Second World War. 

 Dr Amanda Harris is a National Library of Australia Fellow

On a late winter’s day in August 1963, two opposing rugby league captains embraced after a close fought grand final on the Sydney Cricket Ground. This fleeting moment became the inspiration for the Winfield Cup. Dr Guy Hansen, Exhibitions Director, explores how professional sport has been used by advertisers.

What happens to an artist's legacy, home and archive after their death?

Explore the life and work of Hans Heysen, his legacy and the role of families and estates in managing the artistic afterlife. Speakers include art historian and publisher Lou Klepac, Treasures Curator Nat Williams and members of the Heysen family.

A Treasures Gallery Access Program supported by the Nora Heysen Bequest.

The Treasures Curatorship has been assisted by the Australian government through the Department of Communication and the Arts’ Catalyst—Australian Arts and Culture Fund

Only is a painfully honest and entertaining story of an unconventional childhood. Caroline Baum's moving and gripping memoir is for anyone who has felt the pressure of being at the fulcrum of a seesaw, the focus of all eyes and expectations - torn between love and fear, obedience and rebellion, duty and the longing to escape.

 

In association with Allen and Unwin

Andrew Gosling explores how after considerable difficulties, the Library succeeded in obtaining Backhouse's real or imagined adventures in late Manchu China.