Hidden Talent: Untold Stories of the Fairview Art Collection
Hidden Talent: Untold Stories of the Fairview Art Collection is a podcast with artists held in one of Australia’s most eclectic private art collections. It brings together the collective history, creativity and stories of many artists, especially West Australian women from the 1900s to the present day. Discover the stories of inequality, opportunity and determination conveyed through the works collected since the 1920s and housed in an iconic historical home.
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Fairview Tours Australian Heritage Festival Interview with ABC Radio Perth Afternoons 18 April 2024
05/01/2024
Fairview Tours Australian Heritage Festival Interview with ABC Radio Perth Afternoons 18 April 2024
An interview with art collector, heritage enthusiast and owner of historic Fairview, Thomas Murrell with Michael Tetlow on ABC Radio Perth Afternoons Program as they talk about the history of the house, the nationally significant collection of women's art and open as part of the 2024 Australian Heritage Festival..
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Australian Oil Painter Andrew Murrell
10/18/2023
Australian Oil Painter Andrew Murrell
Australian oil painter Andrew Murrell (1945-2023) talks about his art and life.
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Mary Millicent Wigg - South Australian Artist
08/10/2023
Mary Millicent Wigg - South Australian Artist
An interview with Helen Patterson, daughter of notable South Australian artist Mary Millicent Wigg (nee Lamphee) who was active from the 1940s to 2001. She was born on the 8th October 1904 and died on April 29, 2001 aged 96 years after a tragic car accident whilst returning from a painting trip to the Flinders Ranges in South Australia.
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ABC Radio Interview 891 South Australian Evenings with Peter Goers talking about my Uncle's book "To Thyself Be True" by Bill Murrell
07/10/2023
ABC Radio Interview 891 South Australian Evenings with Peter Goers talking about my Uncle's book "To Thyself Be True" by Bill Murrell
Thomas Murrell is interviewed about his late Uncle's just published book "To Thyself Be True" by Bill Murrell. The interview is by Peter Goers of ABC Radio Adelaide 891 Evenings.
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Historic Stained Glass of Subiaco Interview with Thomas Murrell and Jenny Seaton on Curtin Radio
05/30/2023
Historic Stained Glass of Subiaco Interview with Thomas Murrell and Jenny Seaton on Curtin Radio
Art collector Thomas Murrell is interviewed by Jenny Seaton on Curtin Radio about the World Heritage Day event on Subiaco's historic stained glass as part of the United Nations designated International Year of Glass.
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Historic Stained Glass and Leadlight in Subiaco ABC Radio Interview with Thomas Murrell
04/20/2023
Historic Stained Glass and Leadlight in Subiaco ABC Radio Interview with Thomas Murrell
Art Collector Thomas Murrell is interviewed by ABC Radio Perth Afternoon show host Christine Layton about the upcoming seminar for World Heritage Day and the International Year of Glass on Subiaco's historic stained glass and leadlight.
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Dr Bronwyn Hughes on the work of Stained Glass Artists Montgomery and Grimbly
04/03/2023
Dr Bronwyn Hughes on the work of Stained Glass Artists Montgomery and Grimbly
Glass historian Dr Bronwyn Hughes talks about the stained glass work of William Montgomery and Herbert Grimbly. Glass panels attributed to these glass artists are held in the collection at historic Fairview of Subiaco.
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Historic Stained Glass of Fairview with Glass Artist and Restorer Kim Fitzpatrick
03/21/2023
Historic Stained Glass of Fairview with Glass Artist and Restorer Kim Fitzpatrick
Fourth generation glass artist and restorer Kim Fitzpatrick from Tradition Stained Glass talks about his art practice and then takes us on a tour of the stained glass collection of the historic home Fairview in Subiaco.
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Marie Tuck Australian artist : Reflections on her life by Margaret Muirhead
03/08/2022
Marie Tuck Australian artist : Reflections on her life by Margaret Muirhead
Marie Tuck (1866 - 1947) was a South Australian and West Australian painter and art educator who was heavily influenced by French culture. One of her works is held in The Fairview Art Collection in Subiaco, Perth. A relative, Margaret Muirhead discusses her life and extraordinary talent as part of International Women's Day celebrations.
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Jarrad Martyn West Australian artist
12/08/2021
Jarrad Martyn West Australian artist
The Fairview Art Collection
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Joy Tomcala West Australian Artist
11/11/2021
Joy Tomcala West Australian Artist
Joy Tomcala West Australian artist born 1932. Joy Tomcala (1932) was born in Kalgoorlie, married a Czech refugee, milked 100 shorthorn cows twice a day at Ambergate and at age 54 took up painting, becoming an influential member of the Busselton Art Society Arts Society. She is known for her colourful botanical work, especially poppies inspired by visits to her husband’s European homeland. She was mentored by Faith Hemsley.
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Russell Woolf Death: First ABC Boss Pays Tribute Tom Murrell
10/28/2021
Russell Woolf Death: First ABC Boss Pays Tribute Tom Murrell
Russell Woolf's first boss at the Australian Broadcasting Corporation, Tom Murrell pays tribute to the media legend. Murrell hired Woolf in the early 1990s for the role of Resources Reporter in Karratha. Murrell was Executive Producer of the ABC Rural Department at the time and spoke to ABC Broadcaster Geoff Hutchison.
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William John Calvert Murrell - Art Collector and Industrial Engineer 1930 - 2020
01/02/2021
William John Calvert Murrell - Art Collector and Industrial Engineer 1930 - 2020
History of the Bill Murrell Art Collection now held in the Fairview Art Collection of Subiaco
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Carole Ayres artist
03/01/2020
Carole Ayres artist
Carole Georgina Ayres was literally born during a bomb blast in the United Kingdom on the 19th June 1944 when a buzz bomb hit a hospital wall and her mother was blown out of bed. She arrived in Australia in 1952 and is a Western Australian decorative mixed media artist. In a 40-year career she has participation in nearly 250 joint exhibitions and 19 solo exhibitions since 1979. She initially studied shorthand at business college working with iron ore mining magnate Lang Hancock before studying for a Certificate and then Diploma of Art at Rossmoyne TAFE in Perth. In 1980, her painting Woman of the Desert was selected to represent Australia in the Royal Overseas Art Exhibition in London. She is also represented in a book Art Effects by Jean Drysdale Green, published by Watson Guptill New York which featured 45 prominent Western Australian artists. Her work is influenced by 17th century Japanese court figures and the desolate Australian landscape. Her work is held in many private collections, including the two-part series inspired by the Canning Stock Route Magic Hillside 1991 and Desert Trees 1991 held in the Fairview Art Collection in Subiaco, Perth.
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Dr Joan Janet Bayliss West Australian Artist
02/20/2020
Dr Joan Janet Bayliss West Australian Artist
Dr Joan Janet Bayliss (nee Twycross) is an Australian artist, author, teacher and psychologist who was born in Rabaul, New Britain in March 1925 to a wireless officer father (James Twycross) and homemaker mother (Annie) who were both from Western Australia and had married on the neighbouring island of New Britain in 1921. Janet had an early gift for art and grew up in Rabaul until 1937 when a dramatic volcanic eruption forced her family’s evacuation on a steamship. She later wrote about her childhood experiences in a book titled Living in a Volcano in what was then the Australian Territory of New Guinea. She won a scholarship to Perth Modern School, gained a teacher’s degree at Claremont Teachers College in 1945 followed by a primary school teaching role in Kalgoorlie. She participated in her first art exhibition in Adelaide in 1948 while at Art College and in December of that year married Dr Colin Bayliss, a GP who later specialised in rheumatology. In 1953 Janet joined the Bunbury Art Society and remained a member until December 1966 when the family left for Scotland. She was secretary for some years and one year she was instrumental in organising the Bunbury Art Competition. The judges awarded her a significant prize, for which she had not intended to compete, and which made her feel conflicted! She exhibited at least once with Anne Creed in Perth. During a two-year stay in Scotland while husband Colin furthered his medical qualifications, a visit to Europe was to have a lasting emotional impact on her family. In World War II Colin was a Lancaster bomber pilot who had been shot down over occupied France. After being taken in by a local family and nursed back to health he was then betrayed by a spy agent and handed over to the Gestapo. Colin had kept in touch with the French family for 20 years until they were able to meet them in an emotional reunion. After being captured, Colin spent more than two years in a prisoner of war camp and he later wrote an autobiography about his experiences in a book titled "No Flying Without Wings" published in 1994. In 1962 Janet completed a Bachelor of Arts degree as an external student, with a double major in English. This was followed by a Bachelor of Psychology with Honours, then in the late 1970's and early 1980's a Masters in Psychology and finally in December 1988 her PhD in psychology was conferred. In March 1990 she retired from Public Service and consulted in private practice. Her artistic work covered portraiture, abstracts, landscapes and still life’s in her signature style of watercolours and ink. Her most famous work is a quartet of pen and watercolour McCusker roses donated and then auctioned as a fundraiser for the McCusker Foundation for Alzheimer’s Disease Research in 2001. These were subsequently turned into a printed set of gift cards. Her work is held in many private collections and she died of cancer in 2003. One of the watercolour and ink rose quartet, “McCusker Rose in Full Flower” 2001 is held in the Fairview Art Collection in Subiaco, Perth.
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Genevieve Berry West Australian Artist
02/19/2020
Genevieve Berry West Australian Artist
Genevieve Berry (nee McCann) was born in Sandy Bay in Hobart, Tasmania on the 25th of November 1937 to a musician and music retailer father (Leonard McCann) and homemaker mother (Winnifred Deegan). She married in London to a hydrologist engineer Brendan Berry and between 1963 and 1964 lived in Jordan and Saudi Arabia. They moved to Perth in the early 1970s. Her artistic journey started in 1975 when she studied part-time for a Diploma in Arts Studies at Balga Technical College, Perth. This was followed by a Diploma in Design and Watercolours at St Brigid’s College. Significant art influences have been Sieglinde Battley, Trish Austin and Michelle Everest. She won First Prize in the Trigg Art Club watercolour exhibition award in 1993 and numerous other awards including those presented by the Wanneroo Arts Society. She also exhibited in the “Nine to Five” exhibition held by the Contemporary Art Society of WA at Atwell House in April 1983 and “The Reunion Exhibition – Art of Perth Technical College: A Decade at St Brigid’s Annexe 1978 – 1988”. She has been recognised for her work by the City of Wanneroo and her work is held by the City of Stirling. Genevieve has also taught art and her work is held in many private collections, including a 1991 watercolour “Almond Blossom” in the Fairview Art Collection in Subiaco, Perth.
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May Courtney O'Neill - West Australian Artist
02/13/2020
May Courtney O'Neill - West Australian Artist
May O’Neill (nee Courtney) was born at Salford in Manchester in the United Kingdom on the 20th of July 1931. Her mother left when May was eight years old and she was brought up by her father John Joseph Courtney, who could speak five languages fluently and worked for the British and Continental Steamship Company. She grew up in Old Trafford playing in the bomb craters of WWII, left school at 14 years old to work in administration, married in 1952 and then emigrated to Australia in 1963 with her husband Roland and two children. Her artistic journey started in 1973 after being badly injured in a car accident that left her bedridden for eight weeks. To alleviate boredom, she took up painting after being unable to continue with her sporting interests. Largely self-taught and mainly working in watercolours, she has been influenced by Hungarian watercolourist Zoltan Szabo. She has won the Whitford Art Group watercolour award three times and has been recognised for her work by the City of Wanneroo, City of Mandurah and the Rockingham Arts Council. She was a Foundation member and Past President of the Whitford Art Group, and Foundation member of the Wanneroo Art Society, Watercolour Society of Western Australia and the Carnarvon Art Society and past member of the Perth Art Society. She has exhibited widely and her work is held in many private collections, including three watercolours in the Fairview Art Collection in Subiaco, Perth.
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Christine Anne Davis (nee Munsel) Artist
02/13/2020
Christine Anne Davis (nee Munsel) Artist
Christine Anne Davis (nee Munsel) was born at Merredin in Western Australia’s wheatbelt on 3rd January 1961. She undertook her first studies in Art in Fukuoka, Japan in 1978 as a Rotary Exchange student. She completed a Certificate of Fine Art in 1980 and a Diploma of Fine Art (Painting) in 1982 from the Claremont School of Art and then finished a Bachelor of Education with a major in Textiles and Art History from Curtin University in 1986. She began teaching art at Narrogin Senior High School in 1986, in 1988 began exhibiting at local and regional shows and exhibitions and from 1992 to 1997 was a committee member and then President of the Narrogin Art Gallery. Her first solo exhibition was held there in May of 1999 and forty-five of the fifty pieces for sale were sold. This was followed by Awards by the Royal Agricultural Society and more solo exhibitions at the Narrogin Town Hall in October of 2006, 2007, 2008 and June 2009 before a four-month trip through Europe where she was artist in residence at La Magistere, France. A return exhibition of European Artwork was held in the Narrogin Town Hall for the Annual Spring Festival in October 2009. Between 2002 and 2008 Christine pioneered a new style in the challenging medium of mirrors and artwork. She has been represented in more than 100 invitation exhibitions, including Newman College ArtCenta, South Perth Hospice, St Hilda’s College, Hale School, Arthritis Centre, Millbrook at Williams, Mitchell House at Wagin, Wagin Woolarama, Beverley Art Exhibition and Williams Gateway Exhibition. Her work is held in many private collections, and an especially fine early mixed media work Delphiniums 1988 is held in the Fairview Art Collection in Subiaco, Perth.
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Robert Charles Hitchcock - Fine Arts Sculptor – 1944 -
02/13/2020
Robert Charles Hitchcock - Fine Arts Sculptor – 1944 -
Robert Charles Hitchcock is an Australian sculptor of Indigenous Australian and Irish descent. He commenced his career in 1965 and works in a wide variety of subjects and materials. Hitchcock is one of the leading portrait sculptors currently working in Australia today. He is known for his life size and super life size bronze sculptures which are located in private collections as well as public works of art in Australia and overseas. Hitchcock was born in Perth, Western Australia on 19th August 1944 to Winnifred Harris, a homemaker and Norm Hitchcock an excavation driver. In his youth Robert worked as a carpenter and entered formal study in his early twenties at the Department of Art at the Perth Technical College. He initially enrolled as a fine art student to major in painting, however a childhood accident had left him with one non seeing eye and one partially seeing eye which meant he had difficulty in mixing colours and seeing fine detail. Hitchcock discovered he had more of an affinity with sculpture. The early sculptures of Hitchcock were exploratory in nature and diverse in technique and style. Subject matter tended towards realism and expressionism of the "continuity of movement in space" and the subjects themselves included natural forms, and realistic modelling of animals and figures in movement. Hitchcock later moved away from this early realism which he sought to create in his sculptures to a "more stylized and abstract search of forms and planes". After leaving art college in 1969 he worked in plaster factories learning plaster piece moulding techniques, fibreglass factories and various bronze foundries. His first commission came in 1970 to create a quarter life size sculpture of the champion race horse 'Aquanita'. As Hitchcock's reputation grew he received a number of similar commissions from the equestrian industries including racing, pacing, polo and quarter horse racing. These early works led in later life to him receiving commissions for over life size equestrian sculptures of horses in Norseman, Merredin, Moora and Ascot Racecourse, Western Australia. In the 1970s, Hitchcock began to receive increasingly significant recognition for his work including a series of sculptures of the Russian ballet dancer Rudolf Nureyev which were purchased by the late Richard (Dickie) Buckle from London. Throughout his career he has created sculptures of prominent and interesting people. His portrait busts include the prominent eye surgeon Professor Ian Constable, Mary Raine, Professor Lesley Marchant and many prominent Australian public and sporting figures. Towards the end of the 1970s Hitchcock's works took on a larger scale, which was particularly suited for public art commissions, one of the most significant of this period being his sculpture of Yagan. The life-size statue in bronze, depicting Yagan standing naked with a spear held across his shoulders was officially opened by Yagan Committee chairperson Elizabeth Hanson on 11 September 1984. It stands on Heirisson Island in the Swan River near Perth. A recent high profile commission was for the 'SAS Garden of Reflection' in Perth. This consists of three over life size SAS figures in various uniforms from 1957 (the inception of the SAS in Australia) with the remaining two in modern combat uniform and weapons. These commissions are highly accurate in detail and give a true representation of the Australia SAS soldier. Working from his main studio/workshop Hitchcock continues his exploration of the continuity of movement in space. He continues to develop through his sculptures a sense of energy and movement; a continuing challenge when working with an inert mass. He also receives and accepts portrait bust commissions, publicly and privately from Australia and internationally. Hitchcock continues to be highly sought after and collectable and an especially fine nude, the third of five titled Dimity Sleeping produced in 1980 is in the Fairview Art Collection.
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Aurelie Yeo, Perth born artist and former physiotherapist
02/12/2020
Aurelie Yeo, Perth born artist and former physiotherapist
Aurelie Jean Yeo (nee Shearer) was born in Nedlands, Perth in 1934 to an artist mother Muriel Shearer (nee Aitken) and a physicist father. In a 50-year career she has produced more than 1500 works and has held more than 20 solo exhibitions. She initially studied physiotherapy and practiced for three years before studying art at Claremont Technical College. Her first solo exhibition following the completion of a Diploma in Fine Art (Painting) in 1986 marked the beginning of her painting in a full-time capacity was based on impressions gained during a visit to China. She has travelled extensively including six trips to Ayres Rock and one to Antarctica. This included six exhibitions from 1992 to 2002 at the Mulgara Gallery, Ayers Rock where she was also Artist in Residence. A significant proportion of her work has always been portraiture in all media. This interest was initially encouraged by the eminent tutelage of Owen Garde and Henry Froudist. She was overall winner of the 2013 Annual Watercolour Society of Western Australia Exhibition and has been represented in more than 100 invitation exhibitions. Her work is held in many private collections, including the Fairview Art Collection in Subiaco, Perth.
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Margaret Frew - Artist and Ceramicist
02/12/2020
Margaret Frew - Artist and Ceramicist
Margaret Eunice Frew (nee Simms) was born at the Highbury Vale Hospital Basford in Nottingham in the United Kingdom on the 18th of May 1940 to an artist mother and a motor mechanic father, Gwen and Eric Simms. He was abroad when she was born and she did not meet him until she was five years old and at school. Margaret came to Australia as a 17-year-old in 1957. She completed an Art Diploma course from 1978 to 1984 at Rossmoyne TAFE majoring in art history, design, painting and pottery. She discontinued oil painting, as she was allergic to the fumes from the oils and turpentine, switched to watercolours and pen and ink washes and has now focused on ceramics. She had a joint exhibition at Atwell House with her husband John Frew in 1982 and has been a member of the South of The River Potters, the Perth Potters Group, Canning Arts Group, Whiteman Park Potters and The Pothole. In 1988, she moved to Chidlow’s Well and set up the Village Potters Club which is still active today and was in several exhibitions with other potters between 1990 and 2003. Her mother did not give up pottery until she was 90 years old and nearly blind, and Margaret plans to still be potting at the same age. Her work is held in many private collections, including the Fairview Art Collection in Subiaco, Perth.
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