This whimsical Christmas card was created by Mary and Gordon Andrews and sent to Dahl and Geoffrey Collings in the late 1950s. The card features a simple photograph of a little installation the Andrews had collaboratively created in their home at 100 Fox Valley Road, Wahroonga where they lived on their return from working in England and Italy. The photograph was taken by Gordon.
The installation features a row of glass bottles and candle holders of various shapes and sizes with shiny little pebbles, all sitting in a row along the shelf.
Most of the bottles were collected or Â?souveniredÂ? while the Andrews were living in Italy with their children Lynn, Richard and Michael. Lit candles have been placed in the necks of several bottles, while two contain whimsical little hand made stoppers - a cheerful little unglazed clay faun sculpture and a small clay Â?plantÂ? stopper. These were made by Gordon Andrews in Turino (Turin), Italy where he had access to a sculpture studio in the middle of Parco Valentino.
The primitive style and playfulness of the faun, especially itÂ?s lively little face, recalls the ceramics of Pablo Picasso that Gordon and Mary had encountered in exhibitions, and when they met Picasso at Vallauris on the Cote dÂ?Azur during the early 1950s.

Anne-Marie Van de Ven, Curator

References:
Telephone conversation, Mary Andrews with Curator, December 2011
Gordon Andrews, Gordon Andrews: a designer's life (New South Wales University Press 1993) pp78-86

One of many Christmas cards in the Dahl and Geoffrey Collings archive that the Museum's project archivist, Paul Wilson, catalogued during 2011
Archive: 2007/30/1. Gift of Donna Rath and Silver Ware, 2007

Christmas card, Mary and Gordon Andrews to Dahl and Geoffrey Collings and family designed by Gordon Andrews, paper, Dahl and Geoffrey Collings, Killcare Heights, New South Wales, Australia, 1956-1960

Christmas card from Mary and Gordon Andrews to Dahl and Geoffrey Collings and family which was designed by Gordon Andrews. The card features a black and white photograph of a row of bottles and stones of various shapes and sizes. Lit candles have been placed in the necks of some of the bottles while two of the bottles contain stoppers of hand made figures. The text in white running horizontally across the top of the card reads, 'GREETINGS - MARY + GORDON ANDREWS'.

Made: 1956 - 1960

2007/30/1-29/184

1956 - 1960

128 mm

200 mm