When did you start at the Geelong Gallery?
I was here for three days a week throughout most of 2001, working
mainly on William Buckley: Rediscovered and All that glitters:
Australian colonial gold and silver from The Vizard Foundation,
and have been here full-time since the beginning of March. Working
in an art gallery is quite a departure for me, having been trained
as a librarian and having spent the last ten years as the Rare
Books Librarian at the State Library of Victoria.
Why the shift?
The State Library is undergoing large-scale building redevelopment
at the moment, and part of that redevelopment involves the construction
of a number of gallery spaces. I was interested in developing
exhibitions to fill those spaces - and in fact for many years
have been interested in developing more public ways of showing
off the treasures of the collection. For instance, in the early
1990s I curated a number of small exhibitions, including, for
example, Surrealist Texts: the inexhaustible murmur and more recently
have developed a monthly seminar series entitled Talking about
Treasures. So, being attracted to curatorial aspects of heritage
work, I enrolled in the Diploma of Museum Studies at Deakin University,
which in turn led to work placement at Geelong Gallery.
What are you passionate about?
I'm assuming we're talking about professional passions, and so
I won't mention partner, family, children. But then as I look
over them, my professional passions appear so ephemeral. Certainly,
as a librarian and an historian I have developed a deep interest
- even passion - for the history of the book. On the other hand,
I can be passionate about whatever I am doing. For instance, at
the moment I am passionate about delivering the Geelong Gallery's
2002 program and developing shows for the future - Bushfire, the
You Yangs, Edward La Trobe Bateman. I guess in the end, I am passionate
about research - finding out things, making up new stories, putting
together new shows. And what is the motive force behind these
passions? It is a belief, perhaps even a passionate belief, in
the potential of cultural agencies such as galleries, libraries,
and museums to help people and society reflect upon ourselves
and perhaps in the process develop a more humane society.
What was your favourite object in the State
Library collection?
There are many favourites. I love(d) leafing through Diderot's
Encyclopedie, and it was a thrill to handle a small illuminated
Book of Hours, once owned by a Dutch burger - such an intimate
window onto spiritual life in the late medieval period. But my
favouritest (Grr! - Ed.) object would have to be an illuminated
manuscript of the Scriptores Historia Augustae, made for Lorenzo
de Medici in 1479. Apart from the exquisite nature of the script,
the vellum, the illuminations, the binding and the design, it
is just a thrill to see and hold an object so closely associated
with the high point of the Italian Renaissance.
And in the Geelong Gallery collection?
One of the thrills about now working at the Geelong Gallery is
that I can look forward to developing a knowledge and relationship
with works in the gallery's permanent collection. I can't say
yet that I have a favourite, but I find William Blamire Young's
painting Buckley acting as interpreter at Indent Head (1901) to
be a very sympathetic rendering of the dilemma that William Buckley,
the Wild White Man, found himself in. Young depicts two Buckleys
- a white Buckley grasping the blankets that are being traded
for land, and a black Buckley, in the background, more passive
and at home in the Australian bush environment. So, Young's work
is both visually stunning and an intelligent work, and I guess
that's what I'm seeking in other works of art - a visual interest
and an intelligence.
Brian Hubber is the Curator at Geelong
Gallery