Bushfire: Our community responds
Eugène von Guérard

In March 1857 von Guérard visited the Western District of Victoria in search of subjects and commissions. Whilst there he witnessed a vast bushfire that raged between Mount Elephant and Camperdown. Two years later in Melbourne he worked up the subject from his on-the-spot sketches and notes. The Western District landscape was predominantly flat, and his composition is ‘horizontal, relentlessly so,’ with the night landscape strangely illuminated by the flames and billowing columns of smoke. This is said to be von Guérard’s only painting depicting terror and violence in nature.

 

Eugène VON GUÉRARD
born Austria 1811, arrived Australia 1852, worked in Germany 1882–91, Great Britain 1891–1901, died Great Britain 1901
Bush fire between Mt Elephant and Timboon 1859
oil on canvas board
Gift of Lady Currie in memory of her husband the late Sir Alan Currie, 1948
Collection of Ballarat Fine Art Gallery