DETAIL: Grace COSSINGTON SMITH,  'Interior in yellow', 1964, oil on composition board, National Gallery of Australia
 
 
Grace COSSINGTON SMITH | The great illusion: 'He won't do anything - he's decadent'

 
COSSINGTON SMITH, Grace
Australia 1892 – Australia 1984
UK, Europe 1912-14; UK, Italy 1949-51
The great illusion: 'He won't do anything - he's decadent' c.1917
pencil on cardboard
on cardboard
sheet 25.6 (h) x 32.4 (w) cm
sight 24.4 (h) x 29.2 (w) cm
signed l.c., pencil ""G Cossington Smith" not dated inscribed u.c., pencil "THE GREAT ILLUSION" inscribed l.c., pencil "HE won't do anything - he's decadent"
NGA 1976.705.74
VIEW: Article |

Cossington Smith felt passionately about Australia’s involvement in World War I. Her views were informed by her parents’ British heritage and the involvement of her family and young friends in the war. In her boldly drawn series of images titled The great illusion she plays on ideas of Germany’s illusions of power in relation to the Empire. There is youthful passion in these drawings and a measure of satire quite uncharacteristic of Cossington Smith’s later work.

NGA Home | Introduction | Gallery | Search | Essays | Seminar | Learning | Visiting | Previous