Aubrey Gibson

Aubrey Hickes Lawson Gibson (1901 - 1973) was an Australian businessman, arts patron and art collector whose service to the arts included being a founding director of the Australian Elizabethan Theatre Trust and deputy-chairman of the National Gallery of Victoria.

Background and Business Career

Gibson, born on 4 May 1901 at Kew, Melbourne, was the third child of Scottish business manager John Gibson and English born wife Ellen née Lawson.Frank Strahan, 'Gibson, Aubrey Hickes Lawson (1901-1973)', "Australian Dictionary of Biography", vol. 14, Melbourne University Press, Melbourne.] Gibson briefly studied art at the National Gallery of Victoria drawing school, before he concluded that art was not his vocation, saying of that time 'with little resistance I allowed myself to be guided into commercial fields'. [Aubrey H. L. Gibson (1952), The Rosebowl, F.W. Cheshire, Melbourne, p. 3.]

The 1930s and 1940s saw Gibson marry twice, with children from both marriages: to Marjorie Isabel Kimpton in 1930; and to Gertrude Jean Balfour in 1947. Gibson pursued a successful business career, primarily through his own company A.H. Gibson (Electrical), which was a distributor of electrical appliances and parts. The company became A.H. Gibson Industries Ltd, and was listed on the stock exchange over the period 1949 to 1959. Gibson also held other directorships, most notably of Volkswagen Australasia and Hoover Australia.

Gibson's business interests were complemented by other activities. He farmed land at Berwick, Victoria. He was also active in what is now the army reserve, from at least his university days, and served in the middle east during World War II. He was made honorary colonel when placed on the retired list in 1951.

Gibson and the Arts in Australia

His career as an artist may have been fleeting, however Gibson's career as a patron and lover of art was lifelong. The 1950s and 1960s saw Gibson make a major contribution to the arts in Australia, both as a collector and a patron of arts organisations. His collecting extended to some of Australia's most highly regarded artists, such as Russell Drysdale, Albert Tucker and John Brack. [National Gallery of Victoria, Russell Drysdale paintings, http://www.ngv.vic.gov.au/drysdale/paintings/58.htm] His tastes however were eclectic. At the same time as acquiring paintings by 'the younger Australian painters' of his time, he was also collecting antique English silver. [Aubrey H. L. Gibson (1952), The Rosebowl, F.W. Cheshire, Melbourne, p. 4.] This led one writer to exclaim of his collection that 'it must surely cover more ground than almost any other private one in this country'. [Ronald Millar, 'Colonel Aubrey Gibson', "Art and Australia", December 1964, p. 171.] His fascination with silver went beyond that of a dabbler or investor, for he spent time during a visit to Europe in 1952 learning a little of how silver was made from the British silversmith Robert Stone. This was an experience recounted in detail in his only book "The Rosebowl", so named because of a commission Gibson sought of Stone. Commissions may have been an interest for Gibson (his collection included three portraits of himself, including one by Manx artist Bryan Kneale), perhaps because of the closer relationship with artists they would assure.

In Australia, Gibson was an active supported of the arts, beyond merely collecting. He was a founding director of the Australian Elizabethan Theatre Trust, as well as its Victorian chairman, president, and chairman of the board at different stages from 1954 to 1972. Gibson was variously trustee, treasurer and deputy chairman of the National Gallery of Victoria in the period 1956 to 1964. He played other roles in the arts through societies of artists, of collectors, and through boards of which he was a member as a result of his involvement with the Australian Elizabethan Theatre Trust.

Gibson died in 1973, survived by his second wife and a child of each of his marriages.

References

Reading

*Aubrey H. L. Gibson (1952), The Rosebowl, F.W. Cheshire, Melbourne.
*Ronald Millar, 'Colonel Aubrey Gibson', "Art and Australia", December 1964, pp 166-177.
*Frank Strahan, 'Gibson, Aubrey Hickes Lawson (1901-1973)', "Australian Dictionary of Biography", vol. 14, Melbourne University Press, Melbourne, pp 265-266.