William Kelly (artist)

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William Joseph Kelly OAM (1943-2023) was an American artist, art administrator, art teacher, humanist and human-rights advocate who lived, studied and worked in Australia and the United States. He worked across multiple media, including drawing, lithography, painting, wood-engraving, and computer-generated prints.

Contents

Education

William (Bill) Kelly was born in Buffalo, New York on 4 May 1943, and was a steelworker before starting his artistic training at the University of the Arts in Philadelphia, [1] then resided part-time in Australia after 1968 [2] on a Fulbright Fellowship, with which he studied at Prahran College of Advanced Education, [3] then at the National Gallery School, which awarded him the first Master’s Diploma, and where in 1970 he lectured in drawing.

Artist and writer

In 1976 Kelly exhibited at the Melbourne University Gallery work which, as Maudie Palmer noted, involved "literally mapping out the figure or figures and their environment in relation to the picture plane", for which he at first used photographs before using live models exclusively. [4]

Many of Kelly's works from the 1980s were aerial views of the subject, so the drawings, paintings or prints could be hung in any orientation and, as an American reviewer noted, such abnormal visual situations evoked a state of helplessness, anxiety and dehumanisation. [5] [6]

By 1981 Kelly was represented by Axiom Gallery, [7] and in 1985 by Stuart Gerstman gallery, also in Melbourne. [8] [9] In 1982 he had started making computer-graphics work like Still Life: Children's Blocks (for T. Salvas) [10] using an electronic stylus on a graphics tablet connected to an Apple II computer and one monochrome and one colour monitor, a medium that Kelly compared "to the feel of drawing on a soft-ground plate". Prints were made on a B&W dot matrix or thermal printer. [11] From the early 1980s Kelly worked with printmaking technician Larry Rawling in Fitzroy for his fine art prints, [12] and later with Baldessin Press. [13]

As well as making prints, drawings and paintings, Kelly collaborated on public art and theatre works, and wrote art scholarship, [14] [15] editing in 1984 the Heritage of Australian art: reflections of the history of Australian painters and paintings. [16] In 1983, he was a member of the original steering committee for the Australian Centre for Contemporary Art. [17]

Kelly had studios in Melbourne, Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, and Nathalia (his last place of residence).

Humanism

Kelly manifested humanist ideals in his imagery; [18] for example working five years on an installation The Peace Project, in reaction to the Hoddle Street massacre which he exhibited in 1993 in both Melbourne and Boston, Massachusetts, and which received the Australian Violence Prevention Award. [18] His work was exhibited in over 20 countries and, invited to Guernica in the mid-1990s, he visited annually to attend the commemoration of the bombing immortalised by Picasso in his 1937 work, and in 2001, Kelly was commissioned to engage younger people in the commemoration with his The Plaza of Fire and Light a temporary installation using candles surrounding a central bonfire, hailed by Basque artist and historian Alex Carrascosa as re-igniting "the fire of memory." [19] [20] Kelly's work traveled in group exhibitions throughout Europe and South Africa (representing Australia in the Dialogue Among Civilizations International Print Portfolio organised to coincide with the cultural activities of the 2010 FIFA World Cup).

Kelly edited an anthology, Violence to Nonviolence: Individual Perspectives, Communal Voices, poems, essays and short stories by Australian and international contributors renouncing violence, and which was published in 1994 and reprinted. [21] His artwork has also appeared in other books, such as Cultures of Crime and Violence: The Australian Experience [22] and in Cook and Bessant's Women's Encounters with Violence. [23] Kelly's artworks are reproduced in publications worldwide and are represented in over 40 public and corporate collections.

In 2000 Kelly founded the Archive of Humanist Art, with prints and drawings of artists from all over the world that address humanist concerns. The projects have been linked to the Basque Country, Spain; Robben Island, site of the prison that once held Nelson Mandela; the Republic of Georgia and Northern Ireland. Mark Street in 2020 released Can Art Stop a Bullet?, a feature documentary on Kelly's life, work in the peace movement, and travels. [24]

Reception

Reviewing his 1970 exhibition at Watters Gallery not long after Kelly came to Australia, Ruth Faerber remarked that:

... American, William Kelly, expresses a very real and personally involved bias in his paintings of female nudes that overpowers and decidedly weakens their power as organised works. That he does not project love, but rather hate for his hard faced, hard muscled women makes him no less a sentimental and idealising illustrator. His academic life study nudes stand stiffly posed among the other wooden blocks used in his composition to give an illusion of realistic space. The only figure study that protrays[ sic ] any show of human response being the watery blue eyed male nude—and this in a blatantly obvious way! [25]

Janet McKenzie writing in 1986 summarises the artist's concerns:

Kelly's exploration of the restrictions governing human behaviour is intimate and introspective. A recurring inventory of familiar images and objects brought together in tightly woven surfaces create tensions that parallel the relationships of people with their environment. [26]

In his 2006 catalogue essay to Markers Along the Way: An Exhibition of Prints by William Kelly at Shepparton Art Gallery, and as cited by Janet Mckenzie in Studio International, [20] Godwin Bradbeer wrote a counter to Faerber's earlier impressions:

In some ways Kelly is like a Cézanne or Morandi, preoccupied obsessively with the formalities of his compositions and propositions within the theatre of the picture plane; but viewed retrospectively it is apparent that he has been engaged consciously and purposefully with ideals of conscience and intentions of social betterment that have been rarely, and only marginally, addressed by mainstream contemporary artists and institutions. With or without the figure [he] has always been humanist and philanthropic [27]

Educator

In the early 1970s Kelly returned to New York to exhibit, but came back to Australia in 1975 to take up the position of Dean of the School of Art in the Victorian College of the Arts (1975–1982) following Lenton Parr. [26] [28] After seven years he stood down in favour of having more time to produce art and to spend with his family. [9] [29] He delivered several guest lectures at Prahran College, [3] also at Yale Graduate School of Arts and Sciences, the New York Studio School and in Europe, South Africa, North America, Eastern Europe, Australasia.

Legacy

Kelly died in Nathalia on 21 July 2023, where he and his partner Veronica Kelly initiated the G.R.A.I.N. Store, a community gallery, workshop and performing space. [30] He was an affiliate artist and supporter of the Baldessin Studio. [13]

Awards

For his role as an international artist, humanist, human rights advocate, and founder of the Archive of Humanist Art, Kelly received the Courage of Conscience Award from The Peace Abbey in Sherborn, Massachusetts. [31] He was recipient of the Medal of the Order of Australia (OAM) (for Services to Visual Arts and Urban Design). [32] He was Founding and Honorary Life Member of the Australian Centre for Contemporary Art, Founding Member of the Urban Design Forum, and former member of the Board of the Australian Print Workshop. Kelly was awarded a State Library of Victoria Creative Fellowship for Fellow travellers: an unfolding story on Australian visual artists practising since World War I and their beliefs about war and peace.

Selected exhibitions

Collections

References

  1. 1 2 "William Kelly OAM, b. 1943". National Portrait Gallery people. Retrieved 2025-09-22.
  2. 1 2 "Bill Kelly - (1943-2023)". Home for Humanity. Retrieved 2025-09-22.
  3. 1 2 Buckrich, Judith Raphael; Buckrich, J; Prahran Mechanics' Institute (2007), Design for living : a history of 'Prahran Tech', Prahran Mechanics' Institute Press, ISBN   978-0-9756000-8-5
  4. ↑ Palmer, Maudie (March 1976). "William Kelly: An Exhibition of Recent Work, 7 April - 7 May. University of Melbourne Gallery". Profile.
  5. ↑ Zona, Louis A. (1982). "Foreword". William Kelly: Realism in Transition. The Butler Institute of American Art. p. 1.
  6. ↑ Godfrey, Robert; Kelly, William; Westminster College Art Gallery (1980). "Toward Human Intent". William Kelly: works on paper, a survey : fifteen years. New Wilmington, Pa.: Westminster College Art Gallery. OCLC   222818803.
  7. ↑ Axiom Gallery (Spring 1981). "Advertising". Art and Australia. 19 (1): 118.
  8. ↑ "Advertisment". Art and Australia. 23 (2): 146. Summer 1985.
  9. 1 2 Gerstman, Stuart (November 1984). "About William Kelly". Bulletin of the National Gallery Society: 12.
  10. ↑ "Still life: Children's blocks (1981 – 1981-82) by William Kelly (1943–2023) · impression details · Australian Prints + Printmaking". www.printsandprintmaking.gov.au. Retrieved 2025-09-23.
  11. ↑ Kelly, William (Autumn 1982). "Commentary: The Printmakers". Art and Australia. 19 (3): 275.
  12. ↑ McDonald, Katherine (Summer 2002). "Art market: Contemporary print collecting. Melbourne's Print Workshops and Publishers". Art and Australia. 40 (2): 300.
  13. 1 2 Glattauer, Silvina (2020-04-04). "WILLIAM KELLY". Baldessin Studio. Retrieved 2025-09-22.
  14. 1 2 Makin, Jeffrey (Winter 1984). "Heide what now?". Art and Australia. 21 (4): 520.
  15. ↑ Kelly, William (Winter 1986). "Heide: the Sculpture Park". Art and Australia. 23 (4): 518–521.
  16. ↑ Kelly, William, ed. (1984). Heritage of Australian art: reflections of the history of Australian painters and paintings. South Melbourne: Macmillian Company of Australia. ISBN   978-0-333-35707-1.
  17. ↑ Powles, Julia (2015). "The unfinished archive (or the pleasure of looking through other people's things)". Art Monthly Australia (277): 30–35.
  18. 1 2 Shireen, Huda (2011). "William Kelly: peace dialogic". Art Monthly Australia (238): 34–36.
  19. ↑ Carrascosa, Alex (2010). Dia Tekhné. Diálogo a través del arte (in Spanish). Publications Red Gernika, Bakeaz & Gernika Gogoratuz. ISBN   978-84-92804-03-0. OCLC   920321631.
  20. 1 2 McKenzie, Janet (15 August 2008). "William Kelly - Artist as Peacemaker". Studio International. Retrieved 2025-09-23.
  21. ↑ Kelly, William (Ed.) 1994. Violence to non-violence : individual perspectives, communal voices : an anthology, with prints from the Peace Project. Camberwell, Vic. : Harwood Academic Publishers ; Craftsman House. ISBN   976-8097-88-4 (Craftsman House) 3718654679 (Harwood Academic Publishers)
  22. ↑ Judith Bessant, Kerry Carrington and Sandy Cook [eds.] Cultures of crime and violence : the Australian experience. Bundoora, Vic : La Trobe University Press, 1995.
  23. ↑ Sandy Cook, Judith Bessant [editors]. Women's encounters with violence : Australian experiences. Thousand Oaks : Sage Publications, c1997.
  24. ↑ Stephens, Andrew (14 November 2015). "Spectrum: Can art stop a bullet?". The Age. Melbourne: Fairfax Media Publications Pty Limited. p. 23. ISSN   0312-6307.
  25. ↑ Faerber, Ruth (2 July 1970). "Artificial Drama". The Australian Jewish Times . Vol. 77, no. 42. New South Wales, Australia. p. 6. Retrieved 23 September 2025– via National Library of Australia.
  26. 1 2 McKenzie, Janet (Spring 1986). "William Kelly". Art and Australia. 24 (1): 69–74.
  27. 1 2 Kelly, William; Bradbeer, Godwin; Shepparton Art Gallery (2006). Markers along the way : an exhibition of prints by William Kelly. Shepparton Art Gallery. ISBN   978-0-9775149-1-5.
  28. ↑ Pascoe, Joseph (Editor). 2000. Creating the Victorian College of the Arts. Palgrave Macmillan Australia
  29. ↑ "Show with sale". The Australian Jewish News . Vol. XLV, no. 39. Victoria, Australia. 22 June 1979. p. 18. Retrieved 23 September 2025– via National Library of Australia.
  30. ↑ "The G.R.A.I.N. Store". thegrainstore.org. Retrieved 2025-09-22.
  31. ↑ "The Peace Abbey Courage of Conscience Recipients List". 2009-02-14. Archived from the original on 2009-02-14. Retrieved 2023-12-04.
  32. ↑ "KELLY, William Joseph". honours.pmc.gov.au. Retrieved 2018-07-05.
  33. 1 2 "Exhibitions: Melbourne". Art and Australia. 7 (4): 300. March 1970.
  34. ↑ "Quest at Caulfield". The Australian Jewish News . Vol. VLII, no. 49. Victoria, Australia. 10 September 1976. p. 23. Retrieved 23 September 2025– via National Library of Australia.
  35. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 "Kelly, William. (1943–2023) · Related exhibitions · Australian Prints + Printmaking". www.printsandprintmaking.gov.au. Retrieved 2025-09-22.
  36. ↑ "Around the Galleries". The Australian Jewish News . Vol. XLV, no. 24. Victoria, Australia. 9 March 1979. p. 23. Retrieved 23 September 2025– via National Library of Australia.
  37. ↑ "Exhibitions: Victoria". Art and Australia. 21 (3): 410. Autumn 1984.
  38. ↑ "Awards and results". Art and Australia. 22 (2): 420. Autumn 1985.
  39. ↑ "Exhibitions: Victoria". Art and Australia. 30 (3): 418. Autumn 1993.
  40. ↑ "Exhibitions: Victoria". Art and Australia. 37 (1): 140. November 1999.
  41. ↑ "Art directory: Victoria". Art and Australia. 43 (3): 475. Autumn 2006.
  42. ↑ Thomas, Sarah (Spring 2006). "Artforum: TarraWarra Museum of Art. A private vision made public". Art and Australia. 44 (1): 16.
  43. ↑ TheCMSAdminAccount (2006-07-12). "William Kelly's 'Markers Along the Way' at the Shepparton Art Gallery". Shepparton Art Museum. Retrieved 2025-09-23.
  44. ↑ "Art Directory". Art and Australia. 49 (1): 699. Winter 2012.
  45. ↑ Council, Merri-bek City. "William Kelly: Towards the Big Picture". Merri-bek City Council. Archived from the original on 2025-05-15. Retrieved 2025-09-22.
  46. ↑ "William Kelly". National Gallery of Australia. Retrieved 23 September 2025.
  47. ↑ "William Kelly". Heide. Retrieved 2025-09-22.
  48. ↑ "Library fellows | State Library Victoria". www.slv.vic.gov.au. Retrieved 2025-09-22.
  49. ↑ "William Kelly's artist statement for 'Peace or war: the big picture'". State Library Victoria. Retrieved 2025-09-22.
  50. ↑ "William Kelly OAM". State Library Victoria. Retrieved 2025-09-22.
  51. ↑ "William Kelly OAM". Shepparton Art Museum Collection. Retrieved 23 September 2025.
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