Ned Kelly Series

Ned Kelly Series

Ray Hearn's Ned Kelly Series

From the gambolling Kellys during the opening ceremony of the Sydney 2000 Olympics to Robert Drewe's My Sunshine and Peter Carey's True History of the Kelly Gang. From Mick Jagger as Ned Kelly in 1970 to Heath Ledger in the 21st century, the Kellys continue to impact on all of us.

In making these works, I have been most touched by Carey's book, The True History of the Kelly Gang, in which Ned's pregnant though fictitious girlfriend Mary Hearn escapes by ship to California. In this "true history", I might be a direct descendant. In reality however, my ancestors, while Irish, settled in the Wimmera, nowhere near Kelly Country. Another coincidence: Robert Drewe and I were both born in Stawell in 1943. Perhaps we both went to Stawell Primary School?

Too, like most artists, I'm influenced by Nolan's Kelly series. The iconic box-like helmeted figure of Ned Kelly is one perhaps the most recognised images in Australian art, and I appropriate it here. Like Kelly, Nolan too once saw himself as misunderstood and set aside from society: his first Kelly exhibition in Melbourne was largely ignored. Nothing was sold and almost nobody came to see it. I think that the face behind Nolan's Kelly mask is Nolan himself, but Kelly's exemplary bravery and Nolan's war years are in sharp contrast.

And, my Ned Kellys are painted with house paint - not Nolan's ripolin, but a 1980s oil based paint. Today this paint would probably be trendily called deep avocado, but was called by Bristol Paints at the time, which was the Kelly centenary, Sergeant Kennedy. My house is painted with it. Kennedy was such a bushman that in the police search, his deductions about where the gang might be hiding out in the hills allowed him, fatally as it eventuated, to place his police camp just a mile or so from the Kelly's hideout.

It may well be that the view that Kelly was just a thug and a larrikin, and just a murderer, a horse thief and a bank robber holds. But I don't think so. The romantic in me wonders what would have happened if Glenrowan had been a success rather than a sensational failure - would Ned Kelly have been much more, and the northeast part of the colony of Victoria become a southern Northern Ireland?

Like many things, the more I read about Kelly, the further I seem to be from a definitive understanding or to the truth. One thing is certain however, Ned Kelly has had a powerful and continuing impact on my work sine I first made a tile panel of the gang on horseback whilst still an art student in the late 1960s. This current series is my way of continuing to work things through.


Ned Kelly at the Sydney Olympics Ink on Arches paper, framed in Teak. Price: $AUD4000.	Ned Kelly With Parrot Feathers Ink and mixed media on Arches paper, framed in Teak. $4000.	Ned in the Wombat Ranges Sculpture with shovel and found bush timbers $2000.	Ned Kelly With parrot Feathers #2 ink and mixed media on Arches 300gm rag paper $4000.	Kelly - the Movie. Small sculpture of rusty tin, masonite and bush timber. $200.

Ned Kelly at the Old Melbourne Gaol. Cut-out tin with souvenir ruler. $200.	Kelly Writing a letter Cut-out tin sculpture with pencil stub.$200.	Kelly at Jones' Kelly at the Hotel, its doors represented by the kitchen grater.$300.	Helmet Series - Jagger Mick Jagger as Kelly (1970). Ink and house paint on Arches $800.	Helmet Series - Steve Hart Steve Hart's helmet. Ink and house paint on Arches $800.

Helmet - Dan Kelly Dan Kelly's helmet. Ink and house paint on Arches. $800.	Helmet - Ledger The helmet worn by Heath Ledger in the 2002 movie. Ink and house paint on Arches. $800.	Heath Ledger's helmet (2). A second version of the Heath ledger helmet. $800.	Wine Label Suite - Steve Hart .	Wine Label Suite - Joe Byrne .

Wine Label Suite - Dan Kelly .	Wine Label Suite - Ned Kelly .

Ray Hearn • Woodend Art and Antiques • 24 Anslow St, Woodend • 5427 3916 • email