Nolan's Ned Kelly rides again in Vic

One of Victoria's most notorious criminals was laid to rest while another was being
brought back to life.
As mourners were heading to a Melbourne cemetery to bury gangland killer Carl
Williams on Friday, art lovers celebrated the unveiling of an iconic painting of
bushranger Ned Kelly.
For the first time in Australia, Sidney Nolan's Kelly With Horse is on public
display as an acquisition announcement for the National Gallery of Victoria (NGV).
The $2.2 million painting, created in 1955, is the first Nolan artwork of Kelly to
be owned by the gallery following the state government purchase.
"It's very striking, very powerful," Victorian Arts Minister Peter Batchelor said at
the unveiling.
"When you come into a room, when you see it, it leaps out at you."
Nolan's painting is part of his second series on the bushranger.
The artist painted his first series between 1945 and 1946 and revisited the Kelly
theme in the mid-1950s.
The gallery sees Kelly With Horse as one of Nolan's most important works and
negotiated for months to acquire it.
Kelly takes up nearly the entire picture, becoming a confronting and darkened figure
against a bright blue sky.
But unlike Nolan's earlier paintings, Kelly's black helmet is depicted with two red
glowing eyes.
"This is Kelly with attitude," said gallery director Gerard Vaughan of the dramatic
visual.
He said an unnamed Sydney collector decided to sell it for a great price because he
supported the gallery's mission.
In contrast, Nolan's First Class Marksman was recently sold to the Art Gallery of
NSW for $5.4 million - more than double the price as the most expensive Australian
painting sold at auction.
That painting had been on loan to the NGV for 17 years but the gallery decided not
to place a bid to keep it in Victoria.
"This is the one we wanted," Mr Batchelor said of the new acquisition.
"It's very different from the first series. It's a much stronger Ned Kelly."
The painting is now on display in the permanent collection at the Ian Potter Centre
in Federation Square in central Melbourne.



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