Dick Bett This is Me

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1. 1. Bett Gallery Hobart - Aboriginal Art - Karen Casey

   bettgallery.com.au/aboriginal/ - [Cached]

   Published on: 6/23/2008   Last Visited: 6/23/2008

   Gallery director, Dick Bett, is a member of the Australian Commercial Galleries Association (ACGA) and is accredited by the Commonwealth Government as a valuer of Aboriginal art post 1890.
   
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2. 2. Bett Gallery Hobart - About us

   bettgallery.com.au/about.htm - [Cached]

   Published on: 6/23/2008   Last Visited: 6/23/2008

   Dick Bett, Directordick@bettgallery.com.au
   
   Dick Bett knows what makes himself tick.He has distilled the lessons of 30 years of running some of the most successful commercial galleries in Australia and New Zealand into one simple truth: "I'm absolutely driven by art," he says.It's this strength of conviction that has made the Bett Gallery in Hobart amongst the outstanding galleries of Australia.
   
   Slotted between shops and restaurants in the fashionable suburb of North Hobart, the Bett Gallery has a wide plate glass shopfront, the works clearly visible to passers by.Dick and daughter Emma Bett are usually in attendance, as the eclectic clientele drops in.
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   Dick Bett founded the Bett Gallery in Hobart in 1986.He came from a background in fine arts himself, with early ambitions to be a sculptor.Previously he had co-run the Elva Bett Gallery in Wellington New Zealand with his mother who had founded the gallery in the 1960s.Then there had been an important five year stint as director of the Govett-Brewster Gallery in the North Island's New Plymouth, which fostered a deep appreciation of contemporary New Zealand art and art of the Pacific Rim countries.Bett knew of the strong arts focus in Australia's island state, Tasmania, and two years as director of Chameleon Artists' Co-op (now known as Contemporary Arts Services Australia) in Hobart convinced him of huge untapped artistic potential here.
   
   "I became convinced of the prospects for a commercial gallery in Tasmania," says Bett.
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   "There are 90 artists living and working around here today," says Bett.It was the perfect setting for a flourishing gallery with a national reputation.
   
   Dick Bett is often asked "why Tasmania?"by those who consider the island's remoteness a disadvantage.For Bett, as far as art is concerned, Tasmania is very much a centre."Tasmania has an outstanding training institution with an art school that has been operating well over 100 years.In the past, when Tasmanian artists had an opportunity to exhibit elsewhere, they would pack up and leave," Bett says."With the advent of information technology and cheap flights, that trend has been stopped and even reversed."Artists now move to Tasmania to make art, because of the creative stimulation of the burgeoning arts community."It's safe and Green here," says Bett."It's at the bottom of the world.It's about as far away from anywhere as you can get."It's a place where artists can forget about paying big-city rents and concentrate on making art."And the landscape is utterly amazing," adds Bett."That's an attraction in itself."
   
   Over twenty years of working in Tasmania, Bett has nurtured many artistic talents on the island, and the Bett Gallery has become an essential part of the arts scene locally."When you start a gallery, you start with new artists.The job of a gallerist is to build their public profile while at the same time building the confidence of clients."Bett prides himself in being able to pick artistic talent and drive early on, nurturing artists in a way that allows their careers to flourish.
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   We don't do that lightly," says Bett.
   
   Commitment to clients is similar.Bett believes in matching an artwork to a client, and is unwaveringly straightforward with his opinions."We like to nurture long term relationships with clients.Everything a client buys has to be better than the last piece."The gallery now has clients throughout Australia, as well as in New Zealand, North America, Southeast Asia and China.A growing online presence is widening the client base also.
   
   To nurture public knowledge and appreciation of the visual arts, Bett has also set up and administers nine art collecting groups in Australia.Each group has a membership of 25-30, and each member contributes a set amount of equity to acquire artworks.The groups exist for ten years, and meet several times a year to hear art lectures and discuss their purchases.Each piece is lent to each member on a rotating basis, and when the group concludes, after a final valuation to determine total equity, there is a private auction to reorganise ownership of each piece."It's a wonderful way for people to get a good working knowledge of Australian Art, as well as to obtain some superb works of art.Some members become very serious collectors," says Bett.The success of these collecting groups has also given the Bett Gallery an extensive support network which has been critical to the success of the gallery.
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   Dick Bett is a registered valuer under the Cultural Gift Scheme for Australian and New Zealand art since 1890 - including Aboriginal Art: one of few specialists in Australia with this status.
   
   "We deal with about 20 artists," says Bett."Painters, photographers, printmakers, sculptors and ceramicists.I'm quite catholic in my tastes."What runs through all the workings of the gallery is something that Bett says he looks for in the artists and artworks themselves."It's about quality of original creative imagination," says Bett, "and expertise in applying that.That's what we demand of our artists and what we demand of ourselves."
   
   Bett admits to being stubborn, and driven by excruciatingly high standards in the pursuit of excellence.At the centre of it all is a deep reverence for art and the human imagination."The range of artistic ideas that people come up with never ceases to astound me," he says.It is this that keeps Bett, and his clients, enthralled.

3. 3. Bett Gallery Hobart - Aboriginal Art - Mitjili Napurrula

   bettgallery.com.au/aboriginal/ - [Cached]

   Published on: 3/30/2007   Last Visited: 6/23/2008

   Gallery director, Dick Bett, is a member of the Australian Commercial Galleries Association (ACGA) and is accredited by the Commonwealth Government as a valuer of Aboriginal art post 1890.
   
   Click any thumbnail toview larger image,price and availability