A note from the Director
My love and understanding of art developed when I was at art school in Durban, South Africa. I was lucky enough to witness the explosion of a new phenomenon, township art, and to meet Dumile Feni, the leading light of that movement and one of Africa’s greatest contemporary artists. He inspired me and started me on the long road of collecting.
I moved with my husband to Australia in the 1980s, but it was not until the late ’90s that I was again free to devote time to painting and art. It was a meeting with the Chinese artist Wang Zhiyuan, who was then living and working in Sydney, that first opened my eyes to the thrilling new world of Chinese contemporary art.
A visit to China exposed me to a host of creative people—artists, photographers, singers, writers and gallery owners—who were filled with enthusiasm for the country’s creative renaissance.
My second visit sealed the matter. I was hooked! With Wang Zhiyuan, I visited his artist friends in their homes and studios. After countless cups of tea, we would see their work—and continue to talk. On that trip I started to collect. I never dreamed that within a few years we would have amassed works by more than 100 artists.
During these trips to China, I realised that very few Westerners were paying attention to Chinese contemporary art, and that those who did tended to concentrate on a relatively small group of “big names”. I felt that there were many other artists who deserved the same acclaim. I also decided to focus on works completed after 2000, because the turn of the millennium seemed to mark a new era in Chinese art and cultural thinking.
It is this era and its artists that give the White Rabbit Collection its marvellous vitality.
Judith Neilson, October 2008
