Rodney Pople (born 6 September 1952) is an Australian visual artist.

Pople was born in Launceston, Tasmania.^[1] His works have been the cause of some controversy.^[2] Pople studied photography in Tasmania, and sculpture at Slade School of Fine Art, London.^[3] He teaches at the National Art School in Sydney.^[3]

In 2008, Pople won the Sir John Sulman Prize with a work entitled Stage Fright.^[4] In 2010, works in an exhibition entitled "Bellini 21c" were the focus of protests.^[5] The works included images of Bellini's San Zaccaria Altarpiece overlaid with pornography.^[3]

Pople won the Glover Prize for landscape painting in March 2012 with a work that included the figure of Martin Bryant, the convicted perpetrator of the Port Arthur Massacre in the foreground of the landscape of Port Arthur.^[6] Later in that year, a work entitled "Degas's Night" which included Degas' sculpture Little Dancer of Fourteen Years on the background of red-light district in Darlinghurst, New South Wales was also the cause of controversy.^[2]

He was an Archibald Prize finalist in 2014 and 2015.

References