artist's award winning art found to be copies of the work of other artists including Basquiat
Her painting that won the Doyles Landscape Art Award last year, Seaside Explorers (main photo), appears to have been copied from the 2011 Nicholas Harding painting, Two Estuary Figures (below).
Two Estuary Figures by Nicholas Harding
Now questions are being asked about a second painting by Ms Allan, Weight of the Mind’s Periapt (above), which was a finalist in the Darling portrait prize in 2022. It won the Art Handler’s award, that came with $2,000 in prize money.
Weight of the Mind’s Periapt by Ms Allan has similarities with a work by New York artist Jean-Michel Basquiat (right).
Australian artist Jane Allan is facing allegations that she mimicked the work of New York neo-expressionist Jean-Michel Basquiat and British-born Australian artist Nicholas Harding in two paintings that won Australian prizes in recent years.
The Guardian reports that concerns first arose over Allan’s canvas Seaside Explorers, which won the AU$20,000 (US$13,800) Doyles Art Award for landscape painting in 2025. Australian news platform ABC revealed that Brisbane art dealer Philip Bacon, who represents Harding’s estate, had pointed out that the work was a “blatant copy” of the artist’s 2011 Two Estuary Figures, with a difference of scale. The original is a minor Harding work, Bacon said, explaining why judges might not have recognized Allan’s submission as a re-creation.
Jennifer Doyle, a cofounder of the long-running locally known prize, expressed disappointment over the discovery. “Why would you do that?” said Doyle. “If you’ve got the skill to do it, can’t you think of something to paint for yourself?”
Following the surfacing of these allegations, the National Portrait Gallery in Canberra, Australia, announced that Allan’s Weight of the Mind’s Periapt, which was a finalist for the gallery’s closely followed Darling portrait prize in 2022 and took home the $2,000 Art Handler’s award that year, was “clearly influenced” by the work of Basquiat. Allan’s work is similar in composition, style, and content to the New York artist’s 1982 Untitled (Two Heads on Gold).
Basquiat’s piece depicts two robot-like figures side-by-side. The figure on the right has spiky hair, a distinctive nose shaped like an upside down T, white outlined features and spindly arms. The other figure appears to be angry, in a pose that is almost zombie-like. The painting has been described by the artist’s estate as a “vibrant, layered piece” in which Basquiat “[channels] raw energy into two faces that seem to echo and challenge each other, reflecting a sense of duality”.
https://www.artforum.com/news/prizewinning-artist-accused-of-copying-jean-michel-basquiat-1234753259/
= new reply since forum marked as read
Is how the jurors of the competition did not know that these works were derivative without attribution.
I was chairman of the board of a small arts council in NYS , and we often excluded works for this very reason.
The Basquiat derivation is especially obvious.
Derivative is too polite a word.
