Archibald winning portraits in Australia: Rabbi Porush by W.E.Pidgeon

Let's Face It: The History of the Archibald Prize (1999) was a great book by Peter Ross. See earlier references to the prize-winning Port­rait of the Artist Joshua Smith by William Dobell, for example.

Rabbi I Porush, 1961

by WEP
Archibald Prize Archives

John Feltham Archibald (1856-1919) was born to a hard-working, rural Irish family. The lad was first app­ren­ticed to the Warrn­am­bool Ex­am­iner, then at 19 he moved to Melbourne to work in a newsp­ap­er’s print­ing room. Archibald headed north in 1878. He created a part­nership in Sydney with a newspaper colleague, and started The Bul­let­in in 1880, Aust­r­alia’s first quality weekly magazine of pol­it­ics, business and lit­erature. Famous literary men eg Henry Lawson, Banjo Patt­er­son vis­it­ed often, as did top illustrators eg George Lambert, Norman Lindsay.

Peter Ross was very honest about the Bulletin, saying first editor Archibald was a racist and anti-Semite. Its motto was "Australia for the white man". Alas this biz­arre mix of pol­­itical activism and bitter xeno­ph­obia seemed popular then.

In 1902 Archibald was locked in a Sydney Psychiatric Asy­lum. When he could go back into the community, he sadly had to sell his share of The Bull­etin. But happily he was made a NSW Art Gall­ery Trustee, 1915. He died in 1919, leaving a large estate with these cl­auses in his will. Part was used to
1] create WW1 fountain in Hyde Park by French sculptor François Sicard
2] fund the Journalists' Associat­ion Bene­vo­lent Fund and
3] en­d­ow the art prize, judged by NSW Art Gallery Trustees.

The Archibald Bequest gave a prize for the best portrait painted by an Aus­tralian art­ist, of someone distinguished in art, let­ters, scien­ce or politics. Clearly Archibald’s int­en­t­ions had been to perpetuate the memory of great Austral­ians. But there were many legal challenges.

So the Trustees had to be specific in their Condit­ions of Entry. The prize was first awarded was 1921, won by WB McInnes for his Por­t­rait of architect Desbrowe Annear. Then Mc­In­nes again in 1922 with a Portrait of Prof Harrison Moore. And in 1923 with his Por­trait of a Lady. Then in 1924 with a Portrait of Miss Collins. By then the Sydney critics were angry because 1 Mel­bour­nian was hogg­ing the award. And he won 3 more times before WW2! And from 1925, another Victor­ian artist John Long­staff won 5 of the prizes!

The 1920s was a European decade of great innov­ation with Cubism, Sur­r­eal­ism, Dadaism and Bauhaus abstracts competing. But in Aus­tr­al­ia, the tradition of C19th acad­emic portraiture was thriv­ing, ?pres­erved by its geographic isol­at­ion from Europe. Did the Ar­chibald Prize attract con­serv­at­ive­ art­is­ts who weren’t in the mod­ern­ist movement? Or did more modernist artists adopt tonal realism, to win the prize?

Stanislaus Rapotec, 1960

by Judy Cassab

Art Gallery NSW

A modernist who resisted the traditionalism of the ear­ly Archib­al­ds Grace Crowley had entered the compet­it­ion, only to be turn­ed down by the trustees. The Bull­et­in knew that women art­ists should be excluded! The first woman artist to win was Nora Heysen, Hans Heysen’s daughter. Even then the Sydney Morn­ing Herald questioned the trust­ees’ sanity, in giving her the 1938 award!

In the 1940s the youn­g­er, more mod­ern artists were becoming more frus­trated with the same conserv­at­ive, male choices made by the trust­ees. William Do­bell received much criticism when his work Portrait of the Art­ist Joshua Smith was awarded the Prize in 1943.

Archibald Prize went to William E Pidgeon, 1961
Israel Porush (1907-91) grew up in Jerusalem, studied in an Isra­eli yeshiva until 15 then was sent to secular Ger­man school in 1922. From 1927 he studied at Berlin Uni and at Ber­lin’s Rabbinical Seminary, then he compl­eted a doct­oral thesis in maths at Marburg Uni. In 1933 he migrated to London. In 1939, war encouraged him to become senior rabbi at Sydney’s Great Synagogue, holding it for c33 years. He was head of the Syd­ney Rabbinical Court 1940-75 and welcomed the post-war refug­ees. He was res­p­ected for com­b­ining rabb­inical learning, se­cular sch­olarship and leader­ship, becoming President of the Ass­ociation of Jewish Min­is­ters of Aus­t­ralia & New Zealand.

W.E Pidgeon/WEP left his magazine in 1949 to do portrait paint­ing, com­m­iss­ions becoming his livelihood for 25 years. He joined the Journ­al­ists' Club Syd­ney, WEP submitting a port­rait of the modern­ist jour­nalist Kenneth Slessor to the Archibald. He didn’t win until his port­raits of Ray Walker 1958 and artist Ll­oyd Rees 1968.

 Ray Walker, by WEP, 

1958, 

Art Gall NSW

Lloyd Rees, by WEP, 

1968, 

Art Gall NSW

WEP was fascinated with relig­ions and had close Jew­ish ass­ociates eg Sali Her­man, Judy Cas­sab. He believed other por­traits were mov­ing towards more ab­­stract expr­es­­­s­ions, whereas his style was still trad­it­ional. And many of his port­raits were commiss­ion­ed, im­posing greater const­raints.

R’Porush was the only rabbinical portrait that won the Archibald, but he was not the first hopeful. R’Francis Lyon Cohen by Jos­eph Wol­inski featured in the first Archibald (1921). And the same artist put in a portrait of Coh­en’s successor, R’Abraham Wolinski (1931). A 1940 port­rait of R’Leib Falk by Valerie La­zarus al­so got into the exhibition.

The Ar­ch­ib­ald was never far from controversy. The 1961 winning port­rait was of Rabbi Dr Israel Porush by WE Pidgeon/WEP (1909-81). R’ Porush was dressed in his traditional prayer shawl, apparently at the reading platform bef­ore the Holy Ark. But it was actually painted in WEP’s North­wood studio in 6 sittings in 1961. WEP’s portrait of R’ Porush could have been seen as too tradit­ional, but the AGNSW curator emphas­ised that this rabbinical portrait won at a time when the White Australia Policy was still nasty!

Sydney Morning Herald art critic dis­mis­sed WEP’s work as tame, tradit­ional and completely ped­estrian. The crit­ics did­n’t ack­now­ledge the portrait’s social sig­nif­icance, calling it just another depiction of a white middle-aged man in ceremonial rob­es.

Kenneth Slessor by WEP, 

1962

Art Gall NSW

 

How ironic that racist Archibald had funded a competition which eventually charted Australia’s transformation into one of the wor­ld’s successful cul­turally diverse societies. Not only was this WEP’s 12th entry in the competition, and his 2nd win. Since Arch­ibald died,  3 Jewish artists have won:

1] Viennese Australian Judy Cassab won for her portraits of fellow ar­t­ists Stan Rapotec 1960 and Margo Lewers 1967.
2] Wendy Sharpe won for self-portrait Goddess Diana 1996
3] Yvette Coppersmith won for a self-portrait, referencing New Zealand P.M Jac­inda Ardern (2018). Archibald must have been turning in his grave.

See the ABC’s 2021 series Finding The Archibald. Rachel Griffiths’ mission was to find an Archibald portrait that captured Austr­al­ia’s changes, with the NSW Art Gal­l­ery’s Archie 100: Century of the Ar­chibald Prize.  And read Bul­letin magaz­ine in June 1964. To see each winning portrait, go to The Art Gallery of NSW 

Margaret Olley by Ben Quilty

2011

Art Gallery NSW