Love in Life & Art

Revered as one of Australia’s foremost landscape painters, William Robinson is also celebrated for his iconic series of self portraits, two of which were awarded the highly influential Archibald Prize. While Robinson is not widely recognised for depicting the human form in art, one figure is central to his practice and represents the most consistent and prominent subject in his oeuvre: his wife Shirley.

Shirley Robinson (née Rees, 1936–2022) met William at Brisbane’s Central Technical College where they were both students, and they married soon after in 1958. Artworks featuring Shirley appear regularly throughout all decades of Robinson’s output—spanning the interior works of the 1970s, the farmyards of the 1980s, lithographs produced in 1990s and early 2000s, and recent still life paintings.

However, the significance of these works is not to be found in their sheer numbers nor physical descriptions, but rather in the emotional texture and cadence they lend his art making. In many ways, Shirley provided a faithful ground for Robinson’s work—something as essential to a successful artistic career as the mastering of light and shade, or the ability to render an object within the illusion of three-dimensional space.

Love in Life & Art explores how the domestic and aesthetic are intrinsically linked, and how the figure of Shirley encapsulates essential aspects of Robinson’s vision—tender, private and familial images, everyday life, the importance of shared spiritual connection, and a sense of place or being in the world. These artworks are not only visual meditations on the environment in which William Robinson lives; rather, they pay homage to the broader rhythms of life, nature and love—but, most importantly, to Shirley.

Image: William ROBINSON, Sunset with riders 1986, oil on linen. Private collection, Brisbane.