Exhibition Modern Britain - Audio Guide

NGV curators ponder the inspiration behind Kenneth Armitage's culpture People in a Wind and his move away from grand symbolic gesture towards more of a commentary on everyday life.

In 1957, the Soviet Union launched Sputnik. Britain tested its first Hydrogen Bomb. Artists, including John Bratby, painted images of kitchen sinks. NGV curators ask the obvious question: why.

NGV curators discuss The Straw Hat, painted by Mark Gertler during a period when he was influenced by Renoir’s monumental nudes.

NGV curators discuss Alfred Wallis’s painting The Steamer and his motivation to capture the sights of a disappearing way of life: Cornwell’s fishing and shipping traditions.

NGV curators discuss Barbara Hepworth’s sculpture Eidos which means ‘form’ in Greek. In this work, Hepworth is attempting to sculpt form itself.

NGV curators speculate about the meaning behind Lowry’s paintings of British industrial scenes, including The River Candidate.

NGV curators discuss the double meaning in the title of Hillier’s painting and the double meaning also contained within the image.

NGV curators discuss Roger Fry’s paintings Still life (jug and eggs) and Table and the artist’s involvement in the Bloomsbury group.

NGV curators question whether Walter Sickert is seeking to present a sinister view of Christianity in his painting The Raising of Lazarus.

NGV curators discuss Spencer Gore’s painting The Icknield Way which features a subject well known to English audiences: the Icknield Way is claimed to be the oldest road in Britain.

NGV curators discuss William Orpen’s The English Nude, considered a risqué image for Britain at this time. It is a bold painting, the naked woman gazing out at the viewer with frank sexuality.

Discusses William Nicholson’s painting The Beautiful Motorist – here we see the modern woman, dressed in the lavish uniform of that new-fangled device, the motor car.