Drysdale, Russell

Russell Drysdale, in full Sir George Russell Drysdale, (born February 7, 1912, Bognor Regis, West Sussex, England—died June 29, 1981, Sydney, New South Wales, Australia), English-born Australian figurative painter and photographer who was among the most representative of modern Australian painters and one of the first to become widely known outside his own country. His subject was often one or a few figures against a stark rural landscape.

Drysdale’s family immigrated to Melbourne when he was 11, and he began painting, perhaps as a form of therapy, while recovering from an eye operation. Drysdale’s vision of the desolate landscape of the outback, expressed in his paintings and drawings of the 1940s, was influenced by English artists of the time but depicted a distinctly Australian reality. His work was first exhibited in London in 1950, establishing his international reputation, and was represented in the Tate Galleries in London and the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City, as well as in all Australian state galleries. He was knighted in 1969 and made a Companion of the Order of Australia in 1980.