Albert Tucker
Girl
After visiting Japan in 1947, Albert Tucker spent a short period
in Australia before setting out for Europe where he was to remain
for 11years. Tucker then spent approximately two years in the
United States of America before returning to Australia in 1960.
A strong advocate for modern art, Tucker believed that war had
irretrievably undermined human values and in 1943 to 1948 produced
a series of paintings titled Images of Modern Evil which
included images of 'Victory Girls' or prostitutes with scarlet
mouths, stork necks and truncated bodies. Using the same
iconography but a different painting style, Tucker produced a
further series of figures in Paris and Germany in 1951.
Girl is one of these, having been painted in Neu Isenberg
near Frankfurt am Main during the artist's stay in that region.
The painting, with its strong outlines and intense colour,
attempts to capture the despair of the times. Unlike the 'Victory
Girls' of wartime Melbourne, the prostitute portrayed here is an
old woman desperately trying to eke out a living among the bombed
buildings of the former Reich.