Rodney Pople (born 6 September 1952) is an Australian visual artist. Pople was born in Launceston, Tasmania. His works have been the cause of some controversy. Pople studied photography in Tasmania, and sculpture at

Slade School of Fine Art The UCL Slade School of Fine Art (informally The Slade) is the art school of University College London (UCL) and is based in London, England. It has been ranked as the UK's top art and design educational institution. The school is organised as ...

, London. He teaches at the

National Art School The National Art School (NAS) is a tertiary level art school, located in , an inner-city suburb of Sydney, New South Wales, Australia. The school is an independent accredited higher education provider offering specialised study in studio arts ...

in Sydney. In 2008, Pople won the

Sir John Sulman Prize The Sir John Sulman Prize is one of Australia's longest-running art prizes, having been established in 1936. It is now held concurrently with the Archibald Prize, Australia's best-known art prize, and also with the Wynne Prize, at the Art Galle ...

with a work entitled ''Stage Fright''. In 2010, works in an exhibition entitled "Bellini 21c" were the focus of protests. The works included images of Bellini's ''

San Zaccaria Altarpiece The ''San Zaccaria Altarpiece'' (also called ''Madonna Enthroned with Child and Saints'') is a painting by the Italian Renaissance painter Giovanni Bellini, executed in 1505 and located in the church of San Zaccaria, Venice. History The work w ...

'' overlaid with pornography. Pople won the

Glover Prize The Glover Prize is an Australian annual art prize awarded for paintings of the landscape of Tasmania The prize was inaugurated in 2004 by the John Glover Society, based in Evandale, Tasmania, in honour of the work of British-born landscape pai ...

for landscape painting in March 2012 with a work that included the figure of

Martin Bryant Martin John Bryant (born 7 May 1967) is a convicted Australian mass shooter who murdered 35 people and injured 23 others in the Port Arthur massacre, one of the world's deadliest shooting sprees, in Port Arthur, Tasmania, bet ...

, the convicted perpetrator of the

Port Arthur Massacre Port Arthur massacre may refer to: *Port Arthur massacre (China), an 1894 event in which Japanese troops killed several thousand Chinese in the Liaodong Peninsula *Port Arthur massacre (Australia) The Port Arthur massacre was a mass shooting t ...

in the foreground of the landscape of Port Arthur. Later in that year, a work entitled "Degas's Night" which included Degas' sculpture ''

Little Dancer of Fourteen Years ''The Little Fourteen-Year-Old Dancer'' (French: ') is a sculpture begun c. 1880 by Edgar Degas of a young student of the Paris Opera Ballet dance school, a Belgian named Marie van Goethem. Description The sculpture is one-third life size an ...

'' on the background of

red-light district A red-light district or pleasure district is a part of an urban area where a concentration of prostitution and sex-oriented businesses, such as sex shops, strip clubs, and adult theaters, are found. In most cases, red-light districts are parti ...

Darlinghurst, New South Wales Darlinghurst is an inner-city, eastern suburb of Sydney, New South Wales, Australia. Darlinghurst is located immediately east of the Sydney central business district (CBD) and Hyde Park, within the local government area of the City of Syd ...

was also the cause of controversy. He was an

Archibald Prize The Archibald Prize is an Australian portraiture art prize for painting, generally seen as the most prestigious portrait prize in Australia. It was first awarded in 1921 after the receipt of a bequest from J. F. Archibald, the editor ...

finalist in

2014 File:2014 Events Collage.png, From top left, clockwise: Stocking up supplies and personal protective equipment (PPE) for the Western African Ebola virus epidemic; Citizens examining the ruins after the Chibok schoolgirls kidnapping; Bundles of wat ...

and

2015 File:2015 Events Collage new.png, From top left, clockwise: Civil service in remembrance of November 2015 Paris attacks; Germanwings Flight 9525 was purposely crashed into the French Alps; the rubble of residences in Kathmandu following the April ...

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Pople, Rodney Living people 1952 births Australian painters Archibald Prize finalists Artists from Tasmania