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For the footballer, see Wendy Sharpe (footballer).
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Wendy Sharpe
Wendy Sharpe with "Self Portrait with Imaginary Friend" at the Yellow House, NSW, Sydney.jpeg
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 AM FRSN (born 24 February 1960) is a famous Australian artist. She lives and works in both Sydney, Australia, and Paris, France. Wendy has held many art shows around the world. She has also won many important national awards for her art. In 1999–2000, she was an official Australian war artist in East Timor.

Early Life and Education

Wendy Sharpe was born in Sydney, Australia, on 24 February 1960. She is the only child of British parents. Her father, Alan Sharpe, is a writer and historian.

Wendy spent her early years in the Northern Beaches area of Sydney. She studied art at Seaforth Technical College from 1978 to 1979. She later 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 Kind of Art Does Wendy Sharpe Make?

Wendy Sharpe has taught art at schools like the National Art School in Sydney for many years. She mostly uses oil paints to create large artworks. These paintings often show real people, but also include imagined things. She also creates special paintings called murals for buildings.

Chris Saines, who directs the Queensland Gallery of Modern Art, has praised Wendy's work. He said she is always curious about the world and uses her imagination. He also mentioned that she is an amazing painter who makes difficult art look easy. Saines gave her the important Gold Award in 2022.

Painting Portraits

Wendy Sharpe has painted many famous people from the Australian arts world. Some of her well-known portraits include:

Creating Murals and Wall Paintings

Sharpe has made many large wall paintings, called murals, for museums and galleries. These include places like Maitland Regional Gallery and Mosman Art Gallery.

In 1998, the City of Sydney council asked Wendy to paint a huge mural. It was the size of an Olympic swimming pool! The mural shows the life of Australian swimmer and performer, Annette Kellerman. It is made up of eight paintings that hang permanently at the Cook + Phillip Aquatic Centre in Sydney.

In 2020, Wendy was asked to create the 100th mural for the Inner West Council’s Perfect Match program. This mural is called ‘Women’s Empowerment Mural’. It is painted on a wall in Newtown.

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

Art and Performance

Wendy Sharpe has worked with performing arts groups like Circus Oz, Sydney Dance Company, and Opera Australia. She has drawn performers like burlesque dancers and drag queens, both from the audience and backstage. She has also drawn live on stage during art events.

In 2008–2009, Arts Centre Melbourne asked her to create drawings. These drawings were to celebrate Stravinsky’s ‘Firebird and Petruska’ ballet with choreographer Graeme Murphy.

Official War Artist

In 1999, Wendy Sharpe was chosen as an official war artist. She went to East Timor during the Australian military mission. The Australian War Memorial in Canberra asked her to do this. She was the first female artist to have this role since World War II.

After her time in East Timor, Wendy's paintings and drawings were added to the Australian War Memorial's collection.

Art Shows and Exhibitions

Since the mid-1980s, Wendy Sharpe has shown her art often across Australia. Her work has been in commercial galleries, state museums, and regional art spaces. She has also had solo shows in the UK, France, China, and Germany. By 2023, she had held over 70 solo exhibitions around the world.

A big show looking back at her work, called ’The Imagined Life’, was held at the S. H. Ervin Gallery in Sydney in 2011. In 2024, she had another 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 received many international artist residencies. These are special programs where artists live and work in a new place.

She won the Marten Bequest Travelling Scholarship in 1986. 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 residence. Her first trip was in 2012 for six weeks on the scientific ship, the Aurora Australis. She traveled from Hobart to Cape Denison, Antarctica. She created art to celebrate 100 years since Australian explorer Douglas Mawson’s voyage. This was done with the Australian Antarctic Division. Her artwork from the ship was later shown at the Australian National Maritime Museum in Sydney. All money raised was given to 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. In 2015, she was an artist in residence at Funxing-Ginger Art Space in Zhouzhuang, Jiangsu. There, she created a series of artworks about the Kunqu Opera.

In 2016, she returned to China for more exhibitions. Her residencies in Sydney include Taronga Zoo (2011) and the State Library of NSW (2017-2018). The library bought a collection 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.

For the Asylum Seeker Centre in Sydney, Wendy drew 39 portraits of refugees and asylum seekers. Her exhibition, Seeking Humanity – Portraits of Asylum Seekers, showed these pastel drawings. All the money from sales was given to the centre. The exhibition traveled to different galleries 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 at Macquarie Space Gallery in Sydney in March 2020. All the money raised went to the foundation.

To help Lou's Place Daytime Women's Refuge in Sydney, Wendy created an exhibition called Her Shoes. This show featured 52 pastel drawings of shoes. They represented how domestic violence can affect women from all walks of life.

Wendy Sharpe in the Media

Wendy Sharpe has been featured in 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 and new beginnings. This was filmed for the ABC TV documentary series Compass. The show followed the lives of three asylum seekers. 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

Life Drawing Live (2020) was Australia's first live-televised life drawing class. The show was hosted by Rove McManus on SBS Television.

Space 22

Space 22 was a six-part TV series about how art helps mental health. Natalie Bassingthwaighte hosted it. Wendy Sharpe was an art expert in two episodes. The show followed seven people with mental health challenges. Wendy and other hosts guided them through art activities. These activities were designed to use art to improve their well-being.

Site Unseen

Wendy Sharpe's mural, ‘Vu iz dos gesele?/Where is the little street?’, was the topic of an ABC TV documentary. This documentary, Site Unseen, was part of the Compass series in 2021. It showed the mural's creation at the Sydney Jewish Museum during COVID-19 lockdowns. The mural was based on Wendy's trip to Ukraine with her cousin, Ruth Fishman. They researched their family history there. Wendy's family had fled difficult times in Ukraine around 1900. The documentary aired on ABC TV on 24 April 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 important awards and honours 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, Wendy was chosen as a fellow of the Royal Society of New South Wales. She also received a Fellowship from the National Art School in Sydney. She is now a member of the Board of Directors for the National Art School, starting in 2022.

In 2023, Wendy Sharpe was appointed a Member of the Order of Australia. This honour was given for her "significant service to the visual arts, and to the community".

Some of the many awards Wendy has won include:

  • 1986: Sulman Prize, for Black Sun – Morning and Night.
  • 1996: Archibald Prize, for Self Portrait – as Diana of Erskineville.
  • She won the Portia Geach Memorial Award twice in 1995.
  • 2003: Archibald Prize, for Self Portrait with Teacup and Burning Paintings.
  • 2014: Adelaide Perry Drawing Prize, for Self Portrait with Imaginary Friend.

She has been a finalist eight times for the Archibald Prize. She has also been a finalist 12 times for the Sulman Prize, which is more than any other artist! In 2022, she won the Gold Award at Rockhampton Museum of Art.

Personal Life

Wendy Sharpe works in a large warehouse studio in inner 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 to See Her Art: Collections

Wendy Sharpe’s art is held in major collections across Australia. You can find her work in state galleries, regional galleries, and other important institutions, such as:

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