Wendy Sharpe facts for kids

Quick facts for kids Wendy Sharpe
Born	(1960-02-24) 24 February 1960 (age 65) Sydney, Australia
Nationality	Australian / British
Known for	Artist
Awards	Archibald Prize, Sulman Prize, Portia Geach Memorial Award, The Gold Award, The Calleen Award, The Adelaide Perry Drawing Award

Wendy Sharpe is a famous Australian artist. She was born on February 24, 1960. Wendy lives and works in both Sydney, Australia, and Paris, France. She has shown her art in many solo exhibitions around the world. She has also won many national awards for her amazing work. In 1999–2000, she was even an official Australian war artist in East Timor.

Early Life and Education

Wendy Sharpe was born in Sydney, Australia. Her parents were from Britain. Her father, Alan Sharpe, is a writer and historian.

Wendy grew up in the Northern Beaches area of Sydney. She studied art at Seaforth Technical College in 1978 and 1979. Later, she earned a diploma from the City Art Institute in 1984. In 1995, she completed her master's degree at the College of Fine Arts, University of New South Wales.

What Wendy Sharpe Does

Wendy Sharpe taught art at different schools for many years. One of these was the National Art School in Sydney.

She mainly uses oil paints to create large pictures. These often show real people, but also include imagined things. She also paints big pictures on walls, called murals.

Chris Saines, who directs the Queensland Gallery of Modern Art, said Wendy is an "extraordinarily accomplished painter." He means she is very skilled and makes painting look easy. In 2022, he gave her the important Gold Award.

Painting People

Wendy has painted many well-known people from the Australian arts world. Some of these include:

• Ash Flanders (in 2014)
• Venus Vamp (in 2013)
• Magda Szubanski (in 2020)
• Elena Kats-Chernin (in 2017) – this painting is now in the National Portrait Gallery in Canberra.

Big Wall Paintings

Wendy Sharpe has created many temporary and permanent murals. These are large paintings on walls in museums and galleries. Some places where her murals have been shown include:

• Maitland Regional Gallery
• Mosman Art Gallery
• Lake Macquarie Museum of Art and Culture
• The Yellow House in Potts Point

In 1998, the City of Sydney council asked Wendy to paint a huge mural. It was about the life of Australian swimmer and performer, Annette Kellerman. This mural is made of eight paintings. They hang permanently along one side of the Olympic-sized pool at the Cook + Phillip Aquatic Centre in Sydney.

In 2020, Wendy painted her 100th mural for the Inner West Council. It is called ‘Women’s Empowerment Mural’. You can find it in Newtown, on the wall around a house.

In 2021, she painted a very long mural, forty metres long. It was called ‘Vu iz dos gesele?/Where is the little street?’. This mural was at the Sydney Jewish Museum. It showed her recent trip to Ukraine to research her family history. The mural included a picture of her grandmother. Because of COVID-19 rules, the public could not see it. A documentary about this mural, ‘Site Unseen’, was later shown on ABC TV.

Art and Performance

Wendy has also worked with performing arts groups. She designed costumes and painted live on stage for a show called "Triptico."

She has created art while working with:

• Circus Oz
• Sydney Dance Company
• Opera Australia

She has also drawn burlesque performers and drag queens. She drew them from the audience's view and backstage. Sometimes, she even drew live on stage at art events.

In 2008–2009, Arts Centre Melbourne asked Wendy to make drawings. These drawings were to celebrate Stravinsky’s ‘Firebird and Petruska’ ballets. She worked with choreographer Graeme Murphy on this project.

Official War Artist

In 1999, Wendy Sharpe became an official war artist. She was asked by the Australian War Memorial in Canberra. Her job was to record the Australian military role in East Timor. She was the first female artist to have this role since World War II.

The Australian War Memorial website explains her work:

• Wendy started her duty in Darwin. She learned about the mission and drew the daily life in the army barracks.
• On December 12, she went to East Timor on a ship.
• She had a military escort and wore a special uniform that showed she was an artist, not a fighter.
• Wendy spent three weeks drawing the local people and Australian peacekeepers.
• After returning to Sydney, she created major artworks based on what she saw.

Her paintings and drawings from East Timor are now part of the Australian War Memorial's collection.

Art Shows and Exhibitions

Wendy Sharpe has shown her art regularly since the mid-1980s. Her work has been in galleries and museums all over Australia. She has also had solo shows in the UK, France, China, and Germany. By 2023, she had over 70 solo exhibitions.

A big show of her work, called ‘The Imagined Life’, was held at the S. H. Ervin Gallery in Sydney in 2011.

In 2024, she had a major exhibition called "Spellbound" at the Art Gallery of New South Wales.

Travel and Art Residencies

Even though Wendy lives in Sydney, she spends part of each year in her art studio in Paris. She has traveled a lot and has been given many international artist residencies. An artist residency is when an artist lives and works in a new place for a period of time.

She won a scholarship in 1986 that allowed her to travel. She also had residencies at the Cité Internationale des Arts in Paris in 1987 and again in 2007. These were given to her by the Art Gallery of NSW.

In 2008, Wendy was an artist in residence at the Australian Embassy in Cairo, Egypt. She was a special guest of the Australian Ambassador.

Wendy Sharpe has visited Antarctica twice as an artist.

• In 2012, she spent six weeks on a scientific ship called the Aurora Australis. The ship traveled from Hobart to Cape Denison, Antarctica. She created art to celebrate 100 years since Australian explorer Douglas Mawson's voyage. Her work was shown in a big exhibition at the Australian National Maritime Museum in Sydney. All the money raised was given to the Mawson's Hut Foundation.
• Her second trip to Antarctica was in 2014, starting from Argentina. The art she made was shown in an exhibition called ‘Paintings for Antarctica’ at the Australian National Maritime Museum.

In 2019, Wendy and her partner, Bernard Ollis, went on a trip to Svalbard in the Arctic.

In 2014, Wendy had a residency in Oaxaca, Mexico.

She has also made several trips to China for her art. In 2015, she was an artist in residence at Funxing-Ginger Art Space in Zhouzhuang, Jiangsu. There, she created a series of works about the Kunqu Opera.

In 2016, she returned to China for more exhibitions.

In Sydney, she had residencies at Taronga Zoo (2011) and the State Library of NSW (2017-2018). The library bought some of her unique folding book artworks.

Helping Others Through Art

Wendy Sharpe has worked with many groups that help people. She creates art for fundraising shows and events.

She drew 39 portraits of refugees and asylum seekers for her exhibition ‘Seeking Humanity – Portraits of Asylum Seekers’. She drew these people while they told her their stories. All the money from selling these portraits was given to the Asylum Seeker Centre in Sydney. This exhibition toured from 2014 to 2015. An ABC TV documentary was made about it. In 2015, she became a patron of the Asylum Seeker Centre.

In 2019, she traveled to Ethiopia with the Catherine Hamlin Fistula Foundation. She drew patients, students, and staff at the Addis Adaba Fistula Hospital. Her drawings were shown in Sydney in March 2020, and all the money went to the foundation.

To help Lou's Place Daytime Women's Refuge in Sydney, Wendy created an exhibition called ‘Her Shoes’. It had 52 pastel drawings of shoes. These drawings showed how domestic violence can affect women from all walks of life.

Wendy Sharpe in the Media

Wendy Sharpe has been on many Australian TV shows, radio interviews, and podcasts.

Sitting for Wendy

In 2015, Wendy drew 39 portraits of asylum seekers. They shared their stories of survival. This was filmed for the ABC TV documentary series Compass. The show followed three asylum seekers' lives. It also showed Wendy drawing each portrait, which took 2-3 hours. During these sittings, her subjects talked about their homes, careers, and families.

Life Drawing Live

In 2020, Wendy was part of Life Drawing Live. This was Australia's first live-televised life drawing class. Wendy and Maryanne Coutts guided Australian celebrities through drawing exercises. The show was hosted by Rove McManus on SBS Television.

Space 22

Space 22 was a six-part documentary series. It looked at how art and creativity can help with mental health. Natalie Bassingthwaighte hosted the show. Wendy Sharpe was an art expert in two episodes. She helped seven people, who had experienced mental health challenges, use art to improve their well-being.

Site Unseen

Wendy Sharpe's mural, ‘Vu iz dos gesele?/Where is the little street?’, was the main topic of an ABC TV documentary called Site Unseen. This was part of the Compass series in 2021. The documentary showed how the mural was created during COVID-19 lockdowns. The mural was based on Wendy's trip to Ukraine with her cousin to research their family history. Her father's family left Ukraine around 1900 to escape difficult times. The documentary aired on ABC TV on April 24, 2022.

Wendy has also appeared in other documentaries, including:

• An interview with Jane Hutcheon on One Plus One (ABC TV, 2016).
• Several documentaries about the Archibald Prize, like ‘The Archibald’ (Foxtel Media, 2017) and ‘Finding the Archibald’ (ABC TV, 2021).

She has also been a guest on many radio interviews and podcasts. These include Talking with Painters (2020), Conversations (2022), and a TEDTalk about her Asylum Seeker Portrait Project (2018).

Awards and Recognition

Wendy Sharpe has received many honors and awards for her contributions to art and the community.

From 2005 to 2013, Wendy was a member of the council for the Australian War Memorial. Between 2012 and 2013, she was on the ANZAC Centenary Advisory Arts Committee for the Australian Government.

In 2018, she became a fellow of the Royal Society of New South Wales. She also received a Fellowship from the National Art School in Sydney. Since 2022, she has been on the Board of Directors for the National Art School.

In the 2023 King's Birthday Honours, Wendy was appointed a Member of the Order of Australia. This was for her "significant service to the visual arts, and to the community."

Wendy has won many important art prizes:

• 1986: Sulman Prize, for ‘Black Sun – Morning and Night’.
• 1996: Archibald Prize, for ‘Self Portrait – as Diana of Erskineville’.
• 1995: Portia Geach Memorial Award, for ‘Self Portrait with Students – After Adélaïde Labille-Guiard’. She won this award twice.
• 2003: Archibald Prize, for ‘Self Portrait with Teacup and Burning Paintings’.
• 2014: Adelaide Perry Drawing Prize, for ‘Self Portrait with Imaginary Friend’.

She has also been a finalist eight times for the Archibald Prize. She has been a finalist 12 times for the Sulman Prize. This is more than any other artist!

In 2022, she won the Gold Award at the Rockhampton Museum of Art.

Personal Life

Wendy Sharpe works in a large studio in Sydney. She also has an apartment and art studio in Montmartre, Paris. She owns this studio with her partner, who is also an artist, Bernard Ollis.

Where Her Art Is Kept

Wendy Sharpe’s art is held in major collections across Australia. These include state galleries, regional galleries, and other institutions:

• Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney
• Arts Centre Melbourne
• Adelaide Perry Collection, Croydon, NSW
• Australian National Maritime Museum, NSW
• Australian War Memorial, Canberra, ACT
• ANZAC Memorial, Sydney, NSW
• National Portrait Gallery, ACT
• Rockhampton Museum of Art, QLD
• State Library of NSW
• State Library of Queensland
• Sydney Jewish Museum, NSW