Design and Art Australia Online

Jeffrey Makin was born in 1943 in the city of Wagga Wagga, New South Wales. Son to father Frederick Campbell Makin and mother Mary Makin (nee Lanyon), Makin’s affiliation with art and painting began at an early age. Makin was given a set of pastels from his grandmother and was told they had belonged to a family relative supposedly descended from the renowned English portrait painter, Sir Joshua Reynolds.

Through the encouragement of his father and his art teacher at Cowra High School, Makin began taking private lessons in 1961 from Desiderius Orban (who would also tutor Makin’s friend and associate John Olsen) of the Julian Ashton School of Art in Sydney. From 1962 to 1966 Makin completed a Diploma in Painting at the National Art School in Sydney where he also received an Art Progression Student Scholarship. Later in life, Makin would go on to complete a Masters by Research at Deakin University in Geelong, compiling a thesis entitled, ‘Meaning, Significance, and the Sublime in the Depiction of the Australian landscape’.

After graduating, Makin held his first exhibition at the Frank Watters Gallery and received the Rockdale Prize, Drummoyne Prize and the Mirror-Waratah.

Makin’s development as an artist and particularly as a landscape painter was inspired by various techniques, including but not limited to traditional landscapes, modernism, impressionism and abstraction. Through the 1970s he travelled across Europe, the USA and the UK, expanding upon his knowledge and appreciation for various art forms. During a viewing at the Gloucestershire College of Art in Cheltenham, Makin viewed a Giorgio Morandi exhibition that left a lasting impact on his regard for the medium of still life.

Makin’s paintings of the landscape follow an established tradition of the genre, echoing works of great European masters such as JMW Turner and John Constable. However, most notably it is the influence of colonial Australian artists such as Eugene von Guerard and Nicholas Chevalier that Makin came to emulate. Makin also attended painting excursions with fellow landscape artists and friends, including Fred Williams and John Olsen, which recalled the Heidelberg School artists’ camps of the Australian Impressionist movement. One such excursion resulted in the William Creek and Beyond series in 2001, in which Makin as one of 10 artists took part in a commissioned project at Lake Eyre in South Australia.

This series is characteristic of Makin’s work, which harnesses both the delicate but also desolate form of natural vistas, expressing their beauty and also their awesome presence. His subjects typically include seascapes, waterfalls and pastoral vistas. Notable locations such as the You Yangs (first introduced to Makin by Fred Williams), the Grampians and Wannon Falls form the setting for Makin’s keen ability to capture the essence of the landscape in strong, flat colours.

In 1982 Makin’s good friend and mentor Fred Williams passed away, having a profound impact on Makin and his future work. Not long after, the artist went on to exhibit his first sell-out show, featuring the Ash Wednesday series, and then his first European show at Bernard Jacobson Gallery in London.

In 1990, Makin became a full-time artist, following an artist-in-residence program at the University of Edinburgh, Scotland. Upon his return to Australia in 1991, he embraced a new sense of place and belonging, owing to his Glen Harrow home in the Dandenong Ranges. This setting provided him with a lush garden and surrounding landscape in which he could enhance his bold and emotive technique.

Makin has held numerous other working positions alongside his painting career, including senior lecturer roles of fine art with Melbourne institutions RMIT, PCAE and Prahran College of Advanced Education, as well as acting as Director of the National Art School, Sydney from 1996-97. He was also the Art Critic for the Sun News Pictorial from 1972-82 and Herald Sun from 1997-2009.

Makin’s works have been showcased across Australia and he is represented in all national, state and most regional collections. These include the NGA, NGV, AGNSW, QAG, AGWA, Parliament House, Geelong, Benalla, Sale, Townsville, as well as the La Trobe and Melbourne University collections.

Makin currently works from his studio in the Melbourne suburb of Fitzroy. His son James Makin runs a gallery in nearby Collingwood.

Writers:

AngelaTandori
duggim

Date written:

2014

Last updated:

2014