Betty Churcher: Art world remembers former National Gallery director for bringing 'blockbuster' art to Australia
The art world is mourning the death of former National Gallery of Australia (NGA) director Betty Churcher, remembering her as a passionate and formidable figure in the Australian art community.
The much-loved former director of the NGA died last night aged 84.
Churcher was the first and so far only female director of the NGA, holding the role from 1990 to 1997.
She always had a wonderful cascading laughter.
Condolences have flowed in from across the art world, with Churcher being remembered as an enthusiastic advocate for bringing masterpieces to Australia.
Current NGA director Gerald Vaughan said she was a "renaissance figure" and had left a wonderful legacy behind.
"She transformed the culture of major exhibitions here at the NGA and made a very great contribution to what I'd call the Australian phenomena of the important blockbuster," he said.
Loading..."She was just a very powerful figure in the Australian art world and it was a power for the good."
Dr Vaughn worked with Churcher on many occasions and said her enthusiasm still resonated with him.
It was her immense enthusiasm and passion for the arts that saw Churcher change the face the Australian art world.
"She was a person who loved art. She loved talking about art, she was an artist, her husband Roy, who died last year was an artist, one of her four sons, Peter Churcher, is a very distinguished contemporary Australian artist," Dr Vaughan said.
While at the NGA, she earned the nickname of 'Betty Blockbuster' for attracting a string of world-class exhibitions to the gallery.
Loading..."She became director at a time when this global phenomenon of the blockbuster sort of hit Australia with force, and she was very good at it," Dr Vaughan said.
"She could see the potential for having these big exhibitions on a scale that perhaps hadn't been common in Australia before."
'I've lost a life-long friend'
Artist and childhood friend, Barbara Blackman, recalled meeting Churcher at a Christian Cascade camp in Queensland.
Loading...Blackman told 666 ABC Canberra that their friendship spaned seven decades.
"We first met when I was 16 and she was 14. She always had a wonderful cascading laughter," she said.
"[On camp the Christian group] used to go to beautiful places like Springbrook or Tamborine and we would walk around in a long file singing beautiful songs for Jesus."
The girls both attended schools in Brisbane and kept in touch through the years.
"We have always kept close together, we had our babies, you know - your turn, my turn," Ms Blackman said.
"We have always helped each other in crisis times and difficult times.
"I've lost a life-long friend."
Last portrait of Churcher completed just prior to her death
Churcher's son Peter said his mother's enduring plea would be for people to keep an open mind about art.
Speaking from Barcelona, Peter said her passion for art was something she was born with.
"She always said when she was a child she could draw and I quite agree with her when she says that, she just assumed that if you could see then you could draw," Mr Churcher said.
"She thought there was actually nothing special about drawing, it was just like an innate skill that you have, a bit like breathing or the ability to walk."
Mr Churcher spent a full month with his mother as her carer, and painted the last portrait of her at home.
He said she did not fear death.
"She was a very pragmatic person and was resigned to death. She wasn't trying to fight it and was quite prepared for it and wanted to hurry it along," he said.
"The only thing she feared was the process of dying would be drawn out and that she'd be suffering and finding it difficult but her attitude to dying was that she'd had a full life and had sucked the most juice she could out of it."
He said he believed his mother's final message to people would be that they remain open about art and not prejudge it.
"That was the thing about my mother that was extraordinary right up to the end, she was prepared to look at something new and consider something that was different to what she normally liked," he said.
"She would allow herself to be seduced by new pieces of art.
"She always felt if you were open to it, it would give something back to you."
The NGA will discuss in coming days the most appropriate way to memorialise Churcher.