PETER BOOTH
Acknowledged as an important exponent of abstraction through his participation in the survey exhibition, The Field at the National Gallery of Victoria in 1968, Booth dramatically transformed the subject of his work in 1977, painting a series of haunted, figurative landscapes that captured an existential sense of loneliness and desolation.
Booth was born in Sheffield, England, and studied drawing at the Sheffield College of Art (1956-1957). He moved with his family to Australia in 1958, attending the National Gallery School in Melbourne 1965-1969, where he was influenced by tutor, John Brack. From 1969 to 1975, Booth worked at the National Gallery of Victoria, and later recalled the importance of the experience of seeing works by William Blake and Goya. Booth’s abstracted architectural canvases completed up to the 1970s are dominated by black with coloured edges, and have been described as ‘block’ paintings with the austerity of these works remaining fundamental to his practice.
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