Sally Robinson’s vibrant screenprints celebrate Australia’s unique lifestyle, landscapes, flora and fauna with warmth and humour. In these prints Robinson utilises the process of photomontage, piecing together elements from several photographs, and intensifying colours to create composite images that distil the essence of her subject.

In 1991 Robinson received an Australian Antarctic Division Humanities Program Award, and joined the MV Icebird for six weeks over the summer of 1991/92 on its annual resupply voyage to the southern continent. This experience resulted in Antarctic impressions 1992–93 a series of ten screenprints depicting the scientific bases, rugged landscapes and extraordinary wildlife of the region. The series also honours the history of the continent, particularly the exploration undertaken by Australian scientists. Mawson 1993 is a homage to Douglas Mawson, leader of the Australasian Antarctic Expedition of 1911–14. Sailing on the Discovery, Mawson and his crew established the first radio communications in Antarctica and successfully charted large segments of the east Antarctic coastline. He later led the British, Australian and New Zealand Antarctic Research Expedition (BANZARE) of 1929–31, which mapped out much of the coastline and provided the foundation for the establishment of the Australian Antarctic Territory. 

In her work, Robinson has combined a contemporary aerial view of Mawson Station with an image of the BANZARE charts of the ‘Antarctic region – Mawson’ which was published in Mawson’s account of the expedition in The Geographical Journal in 1932. This is overlayed with what appear to be black and white photographs of Mawson and the Discovery, and she creates a trompe l'oeil effect by the illusionistic rendering of two pins which appear to hold the photograph of the Discovery in place. It is at once an expression of her subtle humour and a reference to the layering of photographic imagery that lies at the heart of her screenprinting technique.

Antarctic impressions was Robinson’s last major series of prints before she made a shift back to painting. Since this time, she has explored two distinct strands within her practice: abstraction and portraiture. The UNSW Art Collection holds twenty-nine prints by Robinson, including the complete Antarctic impressions series, and one portrait.

Born in England in 1952, Robinson emigrated to Australia in 1960 and completed a Diploma in Art (Painting) in 1973, at the National Art School, Sydney. Robinson taught at Alexander Mackie College and City Art Institute (now UNSW Art & Design) from 1976 to 1988. She has exhibited in solo and group exhibitions throughout Australia, as well as internationally in Canada, Europe, Japan, United Kingdom and United States. In 2019 Robinson was awarded the Portia Geach Portrait Prize at S.H. Ervin Gallery, Sydney for her work Body in a box 2019. This was the second time the artist has won the prize; in 2012 Robinson received the award for her work The artist’s mother. Her work is held in collections in Australia, New Zealand and the United Kingdom.

FEATURED WORKS FROM THE UNSW ART COLLECTION 

RESOURCES

Sally Robinson | artist website

Sally Robinson | interview