Talks / Short Course

Defying Tradition: Art Lecture Series

Sat 1, 8, 15 & 22 Aug 2026

11am-1pm
Ticketed
Radford Auditorium

$350 Member, $500 Non-Member

Book

Held over four Saturdays during the exhibition season, each lecture connects directly to themes explored in Monet to Matisse: Defying Tradition. Through masterpieces on loan from the Toledo Museum of Art, including iconic works by Monet, Matisse, Cézanne, Picasso, Van Gogh, Renoir, Degas, Morisot, Mondrian, Whistler, Frankenthaler, Rauschenberg, and more we’ll uncover the epic stories behind great paintings and the people, places, and periods that shaped them and discover how artists broke boundaries, defied conventions, and reimagined what art could be, and responded to the social and political upheavals of their time.

Join us for an illuminating journey through the radical ideas and artistic innovations that broke boundaries, defied conventions, and reimagined what art could be. Whether you are a seasoned art lover or simply curious about the ‘isms’ that changed the course of art history, this series promises a rich, engaging experience.

Presented by Tansy Curtin, Exhibition Curator and Assistant Director, Artistic & Collection Programs

Discover how artists like Monet, Renoir and Cézanne challenged academic norms, embraced light and colour, and laid the foundations for modern art.

The first Impressionist exhibition was held in Paris in 1874 and marked a critical moment in the history and development of Western Art. Initially derided for their seemingly ‘unfinished’ works, today the Impressionists have become some of the admired and their work is readily recognisable around the world. Working for the first time en plein air (outdoors) the Impressionists pursued truthfulness in their work by representing an ‘impression’ of the world around them, capturing light, colour and form through the sketchy application of paint.

From Impressionism emerged Post-Impressionism, a broad term describing the plethora of styles and movements arising in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. New art movements were responding to the rapid and unruly transformation of their worlds and the artists’ perceptions of themselves and their place in it.

Pierre-Auguste Renoir, born Limoges, France 1841, died Cagnes-sur-Mer, France 1919, Road at Wargemont, 1879, oil on canvas, 80.6 x 100.0 cm; Purchased with funds from the Libbey Endowment, Gift of Edward Drummond Libbey, Toledo Museum of Art, Ohio.

Presented by Maria Zagala, Curator of Prints, Drawings and Photographs

From Dada’s absurdity to Surrealism’s dreamscapes, learn how artists responded to war and chaos through imagination and provocation.

The Dada movement was formed in direct response to the folly of the First World War, emerging in Switzerland in 1916 before expanding across continental Europe. Known for its mockery of ideas associated with nationalism, consumerism and bourgeois society, the ideals of the Dada movement were expressed through a variety of media – painting, collage, poetry and performance art.

In Paris, Dadaism morphed into Surrealism and was firmly established with Andre Breton’s 1924 manifesto. The Surrealists sought to allow the unconscious mind to express itself often leading to strange and uncanny representations drawn entirely from the imagination.

László Moholy-Nagy, born Hungary 1895, died Chicago, United States of America 1946, Am2, 1925, oil on canvas, 95.6 x 75.1 cm; Purchased with funds from the Libbey Endowment, Gift of Edward Drummond Libbey, Toledo Museum of Art, Ohio.

Presented by Tansy Curtin, Exhibition Curator and Assistant Director, Artistic & Collection Programs

Explore Picasso and Braque’s radical rethinking of space and form, alongside Futurism’s obsession with speed and technology.

Cubism, conceived by Spanish-born Pablo Picasso and the French artist Georges Braque, was a groundbreaking and profoundly influential movement of the early twentieth century. Braque and Picasso departed from single-point perspective to depict the human figure as dynamically multifaceted – as if the subject could be seen from multiple sides simultaneously. This departure from the established tradition, while broadly viewed as radical and shocking, inspired other artists to adopt this approach of dissolving the borders of human figures.

A celebration of modernity, Futurism was a short-lived art movement which embraced the dramatic social changes occurring as a result of mass mechanisation. Although Futurism was predominantly confined to Italy, it profoundly impacted the development of other artistic movements such as Vorticism, Dadaism and Surrealism.

Pablo Picasso, born Malaga, Spain 1881, died Mougins, France 1973, Woman in a Black Hat, 1909, oil on canvas, 73.0 x 60.3 cm; Purchased with funds from the Libbey Endowment, Gift of Edward Drummond Libbey, and with funds from the Florence Scott Libbey Bequest in Memory of her Father, Maurice A. Scott, Toledo Museum of Art, Ohio, © Succession Picasso/Copyright Agency, 2026.

Presented by Leigh Robb, Curator of Contemporary Art

Trace the rise of Abstract Expressionism in mid-20th-century America and its global impact.

For more than a century, Paris dominated the global art scene and was the uncontested centre of artistic expression - but by the end of the Second World War, the world was shifting. Cities like New York vied for attention as new centres of artistic expression and one of the boldest groups was the Abstract Expressionists. The term Abstraction Expressionism today covers a great swathe of artists who were committed to using art as expressions of self and as a medium for conveying profound emotion.

The century between the mid-nineteenth and mid-twentieth centuries was marked by extraordinary artistic innovation and profound social change, laying the foundations for the modern art world. Artists became increasingly connected across countries and continents, forming a global network in which ideas were exchanged, collaborations flourished, and multiple art movements emerged and coexisted. This unprecedented cultural exchange encouraged a diversity of artistic styles, making it increasingly difficult to define art by a single movement or tradition. In doing so, it established the interconnected art world we know today.

Helen Frankenthaler, born New York, United States of America 1928, died Connecticut, United States of America 2011, Blue Jay, 1963, oil on canvas, 112.2 x 162.9 cm; Gift of The Woodward Foundation, Toledo Museum of Art, Ohio, © Helen Frankenthaler Foundation, Inc. ARS/Copyright Agency, 2026.

Photo: Saul Steed

Tansy Curtin commenced as Curator of International Art pre-1980 at the Art Gallery of South Australia in April 2020 after having previously held curatorial positions at Bendigo Art Gallery for more than 13 years. Originally from Adelaide, Tansy Curtin has Masters in Art History from the University of Adelaide and before leaving SA, worked at Adelaide Central Gallery, Flinders Art Museum and the Samstag Museum.

Tansy has curated numerous exhibitions across Australian and international art, including American Dreams: Twentieth Century photography from George Eastman House (2011), The Costume Designer: Edith Head and Hollywood (2017) Tudors to Windsors: British Royal Portraits (co-curator 2019) and, in 2020, Bessie Davidson & Sally Smart: two artists and the Parisian avant-garde. Tansy most recently curated Frida & Diego: Love & Revolution from the Jacques and Natasha Gelman Collection at AGSA in 2023 and Reimagining the Renaissance 2024. In 2019, Tansy co-authored with Penelope Curtin Blooms and Brushstrokes: A floral history of Australian art published by Wakefield Press (reprinted 2022).

photo: Nat Rogers

Maria Zagala is the Curator of Prints, Drawings & Photographs at the Art Gallery of South Australia, where she has worked since 2006. From 1996 to 2006 she was Assistant Curator of Prints & Drawings at the National Gallery of Victoria. Maria completed her Master of Fine Arts at La Trobe University specialising in life drawing practice in the Italian Renaissance, with extended periods of research in Berlin, London and Florence.

She has curated numerous exhibitions on historical and contemporary art including A Beautiful Life: Italian prints from Mantegna to Piranesi (2010), Tracey Moffatt: Narratives (with Stephen Zagala, 2011), Trent Parke: the Black Rose (with Julie Robinson, 2015), and Brent Harris: Surrender & Catch (2023) and was editor of the monograph Ian North: art/work/words (2019). From 2006 to 2019 she was Affiliate Lecturer in the Art History Program, School of History & Politics at the University of Adelaide. She has served on the boards of the Australian Experimental Art Foundation (2009-2012), Artlink (2011), and The Nora Heysen Foundation (2022-continuing).

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