Title

“Whiteley on Trial”

Publication

Melbourne University Press

Year

2018

Category

June Andrews Award for Arts Journalism

Gabriella Coslovich is a writer and editor with 25 years’ experience, including 15 years at Melbourne newspaper The Age where she specialised in the arts. She was the first person to unearth and interview David Walsh, the idiosyncratic professional gambler and owner of Hobart’s Museum of Old and New Art. In 2010 she broke the story of an audacious alleged art fraud involving three huge paintings in the style of Australian artist, the late Brett Whiteley. The alleged fraud would eventually be tried in the Supreme Court of Victoria and become the basis for her book Whiteley on Trial.

Read an interview with Gabriella.

Judges’ comments:

“An exceptional piece for journalism for its dogged determination to explore a complex legal, business and arts story through to its conclusion. It has the capacity to change the culture that led to such a fraud.”

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