The Golden Fleece (painting)

The Golden Fleece, originally known as Shearing at Newstead, is an 1894 painting by the Australian artist Tom Roberts. The painting depicts sheep shearers plying their trade in a timber shearing shed at Newstead North, a sheep station near Inverell on the Northern Tablelands of New South Wales. The same shed is depicted in another of Roberts' works, Shearing Shed, Newstead (1894).[1]

The Golden Fleece
ArtistTom Roberts
Year1894
Mediumoil on canvas
Dimensions104.0 cm × 158.7 cm (40.9 in × 62.5 in)
LocationArt Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney
Roberts' painting Shearing shed, Newstead shows the exterior of the shed depicted in The Golden Fleece.

The painting was originally titled Shearing at Newstead but was renamed The Golden Fleece after the Golden Fleece of Greek mythology to honour the wool industry and the nobility of the shearers. This was in keeping with Roberts' conscious idealisation of the Australian pastoral worker and landscape.[2]

The painting, said to be "an icon of Australian art",[3] is part of the collection of the Art Gallery of New South Wales.[2]

See also
  • Shearing the Rams - an earlier work (1890) of Roberts depicting the same shearing theme.

References
  1. "Photograph at Newstead, c. 1893". Artist's footsteps. Countrytowns Productions Pty Ltd. Retrieved 14 April 2010. "The woolshed of Duncan Anderson's Newstead North Station became the subject of Tom Roberts 'Shearing Shed, Newstead' and 'The Golden Fleece"
  2. "The Golden Fleece". Art Gallery of New South Wales. Retrieved 14 April 2010.
  3. "Conservation of a woolshed". Rural Heritage. Heritage NSW. Retrieved 14 April 2010.
  • The Golden Fleece at the Art Gallery of New South Wales
  • Podcast on The Golden Fleece by Art Gallery of New South Wales curator Barry Pearce.


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