Jan Senbergs b. 1939

Also known as John Senbergs, Jan Feliks Senbergs, Jānis Šēnbergs
  • Artist (Painter),
  • Artist (Printmaker),
  • Artist (Draughtsman)
Jan Senbergs is one of that remarkable generation of European refugee immigrants whose sensibility so influenced Australian culture. His work has been featured in numerous group and solo exhibitions, including a major survey exhibition Imagined Sites - Imagined Realities at Heide Museum of Modern Art, Melbourne in 1994 and a survey of his career at the National Gallery of Victoria in 2016.
Tags: Refugees, Industrial Landscapes, humanism

Janis Senbergs was born in Riga, Latvia in 1939, and came to Australia with his mother, grandmother and younger sister in 1950 as refugees, a part of the program to resettle “Displaced Persons” after World War II. They settled in Melbourne where he continued to live.
Senbergs left school at 15 and was initially apprenticed as a commercial silk-screen printer. His first art education was as a printmaker at the Melbourne School of Printing and Graphic Arts. This industrial background led to a high level of technical expertise that impacted on his paintings as well as his graphic work.
His subject matter ranged from industrial cityscapes to ravaged landscapes, just as he has throughout his career continued to experiment with different styles
The young artist was mentored by Leonard French and in 1960 held his first solo exhibition at the Richmond Gallery, under the anglicized version of his name, John Senbergs.
In 1964 he was included in the George’s Invitation art prize where a work was bought for the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston.
In 1966 he held his first Sydney exhibition at Rudy Komon Gallery. Later that year was awarded the Helena Rubenstein Travelling Art Scholarship.
In 1973 Australia was represented for the first time at the São Paulo Bienniale in Brazil, and Senbergs was selected for the honour.
As well as undertaking major commissions, including a relief mural for the High Court of Australia, Senbergs was an active participant in cultural policy. He was a member of the Visual Arts Board of Australia from 1984 to 1987 and a Trustee of the National Gallery of Victoria from 1984 to 1989.
In 1989 he was appointed Visiting Professor in the Chair of Australian Studies at Harvard University.
He has been the subject of a number of scholarly survey exhibitions, the first being Imagined Sites – Imagined Realities at the Heide Musuem of Modern Art in 1993.
In 2006 he was the subject of a monograph by Patrick McCaughey, Voyage and Landfall: The Art of Jan Senbergs.

Writers:
Staff Writer
7write6
Joanna Mendelssohn
Date written:
1999
Last updated:
2022