Australian Galleries Book Launch

Well, it took a while, but we got there. My latest book, Slow Reveal – The Nude in Australian Art, was finally launched at Australian Galleries in Sydney on Friday 11th of April. The delay was due to the books arriving not long before Christmas and the silly season. Not a good period for book launches!

Stuart Purves and his team at Australian Galleries did an outstanding job all round, but especially with the one-night-only mini-exhibition creating context and featuring work by some of the artists discussed in the book.

An enthusiastic crowd of all ages and drawn from the arts world, architecture, television – even the law! – enjoyed two brilliant speeches. Art publisher, Lou Klepac, kicked off with a witty take on the naked and the nude in art. He was followed by high profile art critic, John McDonald, who officially launched the book with an equally witty and sometimes cheeky overview of the book. John told the mob the book was a long overdue initiative and a welcome riposte to the world of woke.

Unable to ignore the cries of ‘author, author’, I also had a few words to say – mainly to say thank you to the many people who helped bring the project to fruition. But also to point out that, despite the many surprises in the book, it never had an agenda. It really was a journey of discovery where I didn’t know the end at the beginning.

Paul McGillick