Famous Australian Artists

Famous Australian artists at a glance

1. Albert Namatjira (1902–1959): Arrernte watercolourist of the MacDonnell Ranges, founder of the Hermannsburg School.
2. Emily Kame Kngwarreye (c.1910–1996): Utopia painter whose late, eight-year career produced one of the most admired bodies of work in Australian art.
3. Tom Roberts (1856–1931): Heidelberg School painter of Shearing the Rams.
4. Arthur Streeton (1867–1943): the high-key light of the Australian summer.
5. Frederick McCubbin (1855–1917): The Pioneer and Down on His Luck.
6. Margaret Preston (1875–1963): modernist of native flora and the woodblock print.
7. Grace Cossington Smith (1892–1984): post-impressionist colour and the Harbour Bridge under construction.
8. William Dobell (1899–1970): portraitist at the centre of the 1943 Archibald Prize controversy.
9. Russell Drysdale (1912–1981): the drought-stricken outback and The Drover's Wife.
10. Sidney Nolan (1917–1992): the Ned Kelly series, the most recognisable image in Australian painting.
11. Arthur Boyd (1920–1999): the Shoalhaven landscapes and the gift of Bundanon to the nation.
12. Charles Blackman (1928–2018): the Schoolgirls and Alice in Wonderland series.
13. Margaret Olley (1923–2011): still life and interiors of extraordinary warmth.
14. John Olsen (1928–2023): the country seen from above, and Five Bells.
15. Fred Williams (1927–1982): the bush reduced to marks on a field.
16. Jeffrey Smart (1921–2013): road signs, freeways and empty urban geometry.
17. Brett Whiteley (1939–1992): Lavender Bay, and the Archibald, Wynne and Sulman prizes in a single year.
18. Pro Hart (1928–2006): Broken Hill's most famous painter of outback life.
19. Ken Done (b.1940): the colour of Sydney Harbour and its beaches.
20. Ben Quilty (b.1973) and Del Kathryn Barton (b.1972): the most widely recognised Archibald winners of recent years.

Aboriginal artists: the oldest continuous tradition

Indigenous Australians have been making art for tens of thousands of years, and many of the most significant names in Australian art belong to this tradition. Albert Namatjira (1902–1959) was the first to become widely known outside it, painting the MacDonnell Ranges in Western-style watercolour and founding the Hermannsburg School. Emily Kame Kngwarreye (c.1910–1996) took up painting on canvas late in life at Utopia in Central Australia and produced, in barely eight years, one of the most admired bodies of work in Australian art. Minnie Pwerle (c.1910–2006), also of Utopia, painted Awelye women's ceremony designs with a directness that made her instantly recognisable. Clifford Possum Tjapaltjarri and Rover Thomas are the other names most often cited.

SOHO's own Aboriginal collection comes from that Utopia line directly: Betty Mbitjana is Minnie Pwerle's daughter, and Freddy Purla is Minnie Pwerle's grandson and, in Aboriginal law, Emily Kame Kngwarreye's adopted nephew.

The Heidelberg School: an Australian way of seeing

European painters arriving in the nineteenth century found their inherited visual language didn't fit the country: the light was harder and the bush less orderly than anything in a British or French tradition. By the 1880s the mainly Melbourne-based Heidelberg School had stopped trying to force it. Tom Roberts painted the working bush and the pastoral industry in Shearing the Rams and A Break Away!, while Frederick McCubbin, the first Australian-born painter to build a major reputation, took the melancholy side of the same subject in The Pioneer and Lost. Arthur Streeton, later knighted, pushed furthest into the dazzling high-key light that still reads as instantly Australian. Charles Conder completes the core group.

Landscape has remained the most enduringly popular genre in Australian art ever since. See how contemporary painters carry it forward in our Australian landscape paintings and artists collection.

The modernists

Margaret Preston turned to Australian native flora and to woodblock and stencil printing, and did more than anyone to give Australian modernism a local subject. Grace Cossington Smith brought post-impressionist colour to Sydney and painted the Harbour Bridge under construction. William Dobell's 1943 Archibald-winning portrait of Joshua Smith was challenged in court as caricature rather than portrait, and the case made him a household name. Russell Drysdale made the drought-stricken outback a serious subject; John Brack turned a cold eye on city life in Collins St., 5 p.m.; and Sidney Nolan stopped describing the country and started using it, turning Ned Kelly into the most recognisable image in Australian painting. Arthur Boyd and Albert Tucker belong to the same generation.

So does Charles Blackman (1928–2018), whose Schoolgirls and Alice in Wonderland series are among the best-known Australian paintings of the 1950s. Blackman won the Helena Rubinstein Scholarship, was awarded an OBE in 1977, had a major retrospective at the National Gallery of Victoria in 1993, and is held in the National Gallery of Australia and every state gallery. SOHO represents his limited-edition sculptural works, which carry the same figures as the paintings into powder-coated steel.

Post-war and contemporary Australian artists

Brett Whiteley (1939–1992) remains the most romanticised figure in Australian art; in 1978 he won the Archibald, Wynne and Sulman prizes in the same year, and his Lavender Bay paintings are the most imitated in the country. John Olsen spent six decades on the country seen from above, most famously in Five Bells. Fred Williams reduced the Australian bush to marks on a field and changed how every landscape painter after him worked. Jeffrey Smart found his subject in road signs, apartment blocks and empty urban geometry. Margaret Olley made still life and the domestic interior her life's work. Pro Hart made Broken Hill and outback life famous far beyond the art world, and Ken Done did the same for the colour of Sydney Harbour. Among living artists, Del Kathryn Barton and Ben Quilty are the most widely recognised, both Archibald Prize winners.

Whiteley's generation connects directly to SOHO. James Willebrant, whom we represent, emerged from Sydney's National Art School in the early 1970s (awarded its painting prize in 1970 and 1972) into the same Australian art scene as Whiteley, Tim Storrier, John Coburn, Martin Sharp and John Firth-Smith. Encouraged by Charles Blackman to mount his first exhibition in 1973, he has since held more than 60 solo exhibitions, and his work is held by the Art Gallery of New South Wales, the National Gallery of Victoria, the Queensland Art Gallery, Parliament House and Artbank, and in corporate collections including Qantas, Telstra, Westpac and BHP.

The Diver's End, 153x101cm · James Willebrant

Famous Australian women artists

The canon has historically under-represented them, which makes the correction worth stating plainly. Emily Kame Kngwarreye and Minnie Pwerle stand among the most significant Australian artists of any era. Margaret Preston and Grace Cossington Smith are central to Australian modernism rather than adjacent to it. Clarice Beckett, long overlooked, has been substantially reassessed in recent years. Margaret Olley is among the best-loved painters the country has produced. Bronwyn Oliver (1959–2006) is among the finest sculptors Australia has produced, and Del Kathryn Barton has won the Archibald twice.

See our fuller guides to Australian female artists and painters and Australian female sculptors.

Famous Australian sculptors

Bertram Mackennal (1863–1931) was the first Australian sculptor to build a genuine international reputation. Rayner Hoff (1894–1937) produced the figures of the ANZAC Memorial in Sydney's Hyde Park. Robert Klippel (1920–2001) is generally regarded as Australia's most important modernist sculptor. Inge King (1915–2016) made Forward Surge outside the Arts Centre in Melbourne, and Clement Meadmore (1929–2005) became one of the significant abstract steel sculptors of his generation in New York. Bronwyn Oliver worked copper into forms of extraordinary delicacy. For the full story, and the sculptors working today, see Australian sculptors.

Famous Australian artists FAQ

Who is the most famous Australian artist?

There is no single answer, but Sidney Nolan, Brett Whiteley, Albert Namatjira and Emily Kame Kngwarreye are the names most often given. Nolan's Ned Kelly series is probably the most recognisable body of work in Australian painting.

Who are the most famous Australian painters?

Historically: Tom Roberts, Arthur Streeton and Frederick McCubbin of the Heidelberg School; the modernists Margaret Preston and Grace Cossington Smith; and the mid-century generation of Sidney Nolan, Russell Drysdale, Arthur Boyd, Charles Blackman, John Olsen, Fred Williams and Brett Whiteley.

Who are the most famous Aboriginal artists?

Albert Namatjira, Emily Kame Kngwarreye, Minnie Pwerle, Clifford Possum Tjapaltjarri and Rover Thomas are the names most often cited.

Who are the most famous Australian women artists?

Emily Kame Kngwarreye, Margaret Preston, Grace Cossington Smith, Clarice Beckett, Margaret Olley and, among living artists, Del Kathryn Barton.

Who is the most famous Australian sculptor?

Robert Klippel is the name most often given for the modern period, and Bertram Mackennal for the era before it.

Can I buy work by famous Australian artists?

Major historical works mostly change hands at auction, but established artists with significant public-collection histories are still collectable through galleries. SOHO Galleries in Woollahra, Sydney represents artists including James Willebrant and Charles Blackman's limited-edition sculptural works. Contact the gallery to ask about a particular artist.

Last updated: October 2026