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sl8

(16,247 posts)
Wed May 15, 2024, 10:41 AM May 2024

Billionaire Calls for Removal of 'Unflattering' Portrait from National Gallery of Australia

https://www.artnews.com/art-news/news/gina-rinehart-vincent-namatjira-painting-billionaire-removal-request-national-gallery-of-australia-1234706891/

Billionaire Calls for Removal of ‘Unflattering’ Portrait from National Gallery of Australia

BY ALEX GREENBERGER
May 15, 2024 10:45am



Vincent Namatjira with various portraits by him, including one of Gina Rinehart, third from left in the bottom row.
©VINCENT NAMATJIRA/COPYRIGHT AGENCY/PHOTO IWANTJA ARTS/COURTESY THE ARTIST AND IWANTJA ARTS


Gina Rinehart, the richest person in Australia, has reportedly called on Canberra’s National Gallery of Australia to take down a painting of her by Aboriginal artist Vincent Namatjira.

It wasn’t immediately clear what had moved Rinehart, a donor to the National Gallery of Australia, to make the request, but it was clear, at least, that Namatjira’s portrait was viewed as being not the kindest representation of her. Both the Guardian and the Sydney Morning Herald used the word “unflattering” to describe the picture, which renders her skin a pinkish color, exaggerates the folds on her chin, and turns her lips downward into a frown.

The painting is one of nearly two dozen portraits that appears in Namatjira’s current retrospective at the museum, which traveled the show from the Art Gallery of South Australia in Adelaide.

In Australia, Namatjira is well-known and much-loved. He became the first Indigenous artist to win the Archibald Prize, a prestigious Australian award for portraiture, in 2020.

[...]




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Billionaire Calls for Removal of 'Unflattering' Portrait from National Gallery of Australia (Original Post) sl8 May 2024 OP
Swimming boss defends athletes lobbying national gallery to take down Gina Rinehart portraits sl8 May 2024 #1

sl8

(16,247 posts)
1. Swimming boss defends athletes lobbying national gallery to take down Gina Rinehart portraits
Fri May 17, 2024, 06:05 AM
May 2024
https://www.theguardian.com/business/article/2024/may/17/gina-rinehart-portrait-nga-national-gallery-australia-olympic-swimmers-vincent-namatjira-kevin-hasemann

Swimming boss defends athletes lobbying national gallery to take down Gina Rinehart portraits

Swimming Queensland chief Kevin Hasemann says ‘I’ve never been to a gallery’ and furore has ‘evolved into something I could never have imagined’

Ben Doherty
Fri 17 May 2024 03.50 EDT

The head of Swimming Queensland has defended a campaign that saw Olympic champions lobby the National Gallery of Australia to take down portraits of their patron, Gina Rinehart, because they were deemed “offensive”.

[...]

Rinehart’s company Hancock Prospecting is a major sponsor of Australian Olympic sports – funding sports bodies as well as individual athletes.

The sponsorship is often conditional, however. In 2022, Rinehart withdrew a $15m sponsorship of Netball Australia after the Indigenous netballer Donnell Wallam asked for her uniform not to carry the Hancock Prospecting logo.

[...]

Hancock Prospecting has sponsored Australian swimmers to the tune of $40m.

[...]

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