The Charles Nodrum Gallery first opened its doors on 11 September 1984, at 295 Church Street in Richmond. The gallery moved to its current location at 267 Church Street in March 1988.
The gallery has supported the Australian abstraction movement solidly since the beginning with artist like George Johnson, David Aspden, and John Peart being some of the first to exhibit and still showing with the gallery 30 years later. The annual Abstraction exhibition started in 2002 and has been greatly admired for its diversity and thorough overview of Australian and international Abstraction.
The Charles Nodrum Gallery group shows illustrate interesting connections between stylistic movements as well as personal connections between artists – they often include work by lesser-known artists alongside some of the biggest names in Australian Art, creating a rich view of Australian Art.
Throughout the past 30 years the gallery has had the chance to introduce notable International artists to the Australian scene; these include Jules Olitski, Paula Rego, and most recently John Hoyland.
The galleries most infamous show would have to be Mike Brown’s, Hard, Fast and Deep exhibition from 1987. Although it was far less controversial in 1987 compared with the re-exhibition of some of the works in 2013 in the ‘Like Mike’ series of exhibitions.
The gallery takes a lot of pride in continuing the legacy of artists Estates such as David Aspden, Mike Brown, James Gleeson, Godfrey Miller, Paul Partos, Michael Shannon, Norma Redpath, Edwin Tanner and Peter Upward. The gallery has worked closely with institutions putting on retrospective exhibitions with Charles often being asked to write on these artists or coordinating loans for the exhibitions.
With an academic leaning the gallery has aimed to protect the legacy of artists who seem to slip through the general popularity stakes, and over time with some reassessment, are now starting to be noticed for their contribution to Australian Modern Art. Charles is the only dealer in 1960-70s art in Australia.
The Charles Nodrum Gallery has really run a duel system; of dealing in the secondary market and primary sales market – which is quite rare now. The secondary market utilises Charles’ extensive knowledge, where he has assisted private clients in creating comprehensive and impressive personal collections. Having been appointed a Commonwealth valuer with the Tax Incentives for the Arts Scheme since its inception in 1978, Charles has valued many important public collections over the years. These include Museum of Contemporary Art (Brisbane), RMIT, Tarrawarra Museum, Holmes a Court Collection (Perth), the Bank of Melbourne, Gippsland Art Gallery Collection, Warrnambool Art Gallery, La Trobe Regional Gallery Collection and Heide Museum of Modern Art.
30th Anniversary Group Show
Charles Nodrum Gallery
8 to 29 March, 2014
Melbourne
Charles Nodrum (self)
