Incident at Hanging Rock

by Gregg Chadwick

At the Hanging Rock  by William Ford (1820–1886)

1875, oil on canvas, 79.2 x 117.5 cm

Collection of the National Gallery of Victoria

As March drew to a close, Bruce Springsteen and the E Street band played a concert that Australian music writers have lauded. I wish I could have been there to see Springsteen and the band rip it up at Hanging Rock. 

Incident on 57th Street in Australia 
Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band 

Live at Hanging Rock - Second Night - 31-03-2013

 Major international musicians often perform outdoor concerts at the Hanging Rock reserve. Leonard Cohen graced the venue in 2010 and last month Springsteen performed two shows at the conclusion of the Australian leg of his 'Wrecking Ball' tour. The musical venue at Hanging Rock is temporary and currently used about once a year for large concerts. 

Though I have spent quite a bit of time travelling through Australia over the years, I have not been to Hanging Rock in person. But, I have been there in the visions of painting and film, especially Peter Weir's remarkable Picnic at Hanging Rock. Weir's film, based on the novel by Australian author Joan Lindsay, focuses on a group of girls at a fictional Australian women's college  who vanish during a Valentine's Day picnic at Hanging Rock in 1900.



Roger Ebert described Picnic at Hanging Rock as "a film of haunting mystery and buried sexual hysteria" and remarked that it "employs two of the hallmarks of modern Australian films: beautiful cinematography and stories about the chasm between settlers from Europe and the mysteries of their ancient new home." That chasm between European culture and indigenous Australia especially revolves around the conception of time. Joan Lindsay in her autobiography, Time Without Clocks, describes how these mysteries felt to her:

"There were certain days when I sat at my typewriter in the empty green-aired room feeling like a deep-sea fish suspended in its natural element. Not only in my fish tank but outside in the sheltered valley all natural objects seemed in a state of suspension as they do immediately before an earthquake. It was a characteristic of the Marsh and perhaps had something to do with the old volcanoes seething and boiling so far below the earth’s crust that even the geologists hadn’t discovered them." 
- Joan Lindsay,  p124 (Time Without Clocks)

Art in all its guises evokes the mysteries of time and the most compelling creations leave the questions unanswered.

The Darkness - Leonard Cohen

Live at Hanging Rock - 21-11-2010

Vale Robert Hughes: Influential Author, Artlover and Art Critic Dies at 74

 "I have always tended to take art contextually. If I have any merits as a critic, they have to do with my ability as a storyteller — and above all I wanted to tell a story."
Robert Hughes in Salon, May 23, 1997

Robert Hughes in New York City - 1970's

In a 1997 piece on "60 Minutes," correspondent Steve Kroft said to Robert Hughes that he was the most powerful art critic in the world. Hughes deftly avoided the moniker and described his job as being akin to being the most important beekeeper in the world and that his influence said more about Time magazine than it did about the importance of his writing. But Robert Hughes writing is important. For many of us it was the first real taste of the transcendence and power of great art. Since I discovered the art criticism of Robert Hughes in Time magazine when I was a teenager, I have eagerly awaited each of his new works. Robert's articles, books, and documentaries helped open the worlds of art and history to me. Robert wrote clearly about art, taking pains to avoid jargon and faddish arguments. Hughes expressed that he was drawn to artworks that explored the questions: "Why am I here? And what am I doing here?" This search for philosophical and metaphysical concepts underscored much of the great art that Hughes explored in his work and shared with us. 

The Critic's Eyes
Robert Hughes - 2008

With great sadness I note that at the age of 74, Robert has died after suffering through a long illness. Robert Hughes will be greatly missed.

Robert Hughes on 60 Minutes in 1997

Robert Hughes in Italy - 1960's

The Mona Lisa Curse
Written and Presented by Robert Hughes


More At:
Robert Hughes Dies at 74: The New York Times
Hughes Views in Salon