The painted chest, 1956
Donald Friend
oil on canvas
43.5 x 59.0 cm
signed and dated lower right: DONALD FRIEND ‘56
Macquarie Galleries, Sydney
James O. Fairfax, Sydney
Christie's, Sydney, 25 October 1994, lot 21
Martin Browne Fine Art, Sydney (label attached verso)
Private collection
Philip Bacon Galleries, Brisbane (label attached verso)
Private collection, Sydney
Donald Friend - Paintings, Macquarie Galleries, Sydney, 8 – 27 May 1957, cat. 2
Donald Friend, Retrospective, Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney, 9 February - 25 March 1990, and touring to; National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne, 14 April – 6 June 1990 and Tasmanian Museum and Art Gallery, Hobart, 26 June – 19 August 1990, cat. 65 (label attached verso)
Pearce, B. & Klepac, L., Donald Friend, Art Gallery of New South Wales and The Beagle Press, Sydney, 1990, cat. 65, p. 86 (illus.)
The following excerpt is from the diary of Donald Friend, 21 February 1953, reproduced in Hetherington, P. (ed.), The Diaries of Donald Friend, Volume 3, National Library of Australia, Canberra, 2005, p. 194:
‘I have painted with bright enamels crazy scenes and people all over the chest that carried my goods from Italy. It looks very pretty, so convincingly like a genuine piece of folk art. Ken [Kenneth Rowell] and I have joked about selling it to Americans. The scenes show our bête noir, Pertwee showing off, also Maggie, Dick, their dog, Moira Combe and her burglar, also hunting stags, and Ken being pestered by Nan, who is an infuriating woman who haunts the place with gifts, and Omu going to Sweden, Lady Docker in her Rolls and Rita Hayworth with Ali Khan – all this in startling rather rude colours. To use them so freely is a joy. I wish I could paint my senior works as unrestrainedly, but I cannot. Good taste and craftsmanship and a dozen more weighty spoilsport considerations creep in, while spontaneity flies out.’