Sharp: 1942-1979

A Biography Of Martin Sharp

Lowell Tarling

• Publisher: ETT Imprint
• Year: 2016
• Print ISBN:
  9781925416589
• eBook ISBN:
  9781925416596
• Topic: Art
• Subtopic: Artist Biographies

Martin Sharp was an integral part of international Pop Art in the 1960s, magnified through his covers for OZ magazine in Sydney and London, his covers for Cream, and posters of Dylan, Hendrix and Donovan. His efforts at making The Yellow House and Luna Park cultural precincts were aided by his screen prints and exhibitions to flaunt the work of others, especially the singer Tiny Tim. In this first of two volumes, Lowell Tarling offers us a way into the enigmatic and reclusive artist, through interviews with Sharp and all of his trusted friends, including artists Tim Lewis, Peter Kingston, Garry Shead, photographers Greg Weight, Jonny Lewis and William Yang, film-maker Phillippe Mora, actor Lex Marinos, musicians Mic Conway, Jeannie Lewis, Tiny Tim; Richard Neville and Jim Anderson from London Oz. 'Lowell Tarling was a close friend of Martin Sharp and other Yellow House artists for over forty years and has been recording interviews and discussions with Martin and the rest of us all that time. This is an extraordinary archive of primary source material of those heady and life changing times.' - Roger Foley-Fogg (Ellis D Fogg) 'Martin Sharp, through this wonderful collage of interviews, reminds us all, that ETERNITY is just around corner.' - Jonny Lewis

1.
THE LITTLE PRINCE

Finger painting, I remember doing that.
Miss Koulson was very good, my first art teacher.

MARTIN SHARP

Martin Ritchie Sharp was born in Sydney, 21 January 1942, the day of the first Japanese air strike on Rabaul, Papua & New Guinea. His first home was his Ritchie grandparents’ place, Wirian, 3 Victoria Road Bellevue Hill.

For the duration of the war, Martin’s father, Dr Henry Sharp had been assigned to the Medical Branch of the RAAF with the rank of Flight Lieutenant. At the time of Martin’s birth, he was working on the RAAF Recruiting Train, which carried staff to deal with enlistments for the war effort. On hearing the joyous news, Henry hurried home the next day to welcome his newborn son. (1)

Within six months, Henry was shipped overseas where he joined the Spitfire Squadron 453, an Australian air control unit of the RAAF in England. (2) Martin said, ‘He loved those years but the worst thing was having to examine the pilots and give them a health clearance. It’s like writing a death warrant. The average age was 22 and he knew that 45 per cent of the time he’d never see them again.’ (3)

That was Henry’s life for the next three and a half years while his wife Joan (Jo) and son Martin were living an extremely comfortable life back home. Their only indication of World War 2 was the night of 31 May when three Japanese midget submarines entered Sydney Harbour and attempted to sink Allied warships. (4) Wirian has distant harbour views from the first floor verandah. Jo took baby Martin upstairs and watched the action like fireworks. She later told him the bombardments shook the house. Too young to comprehend those ‘fireworks’, Martin has a clearer memory of wartime double-decker buses painted in camouflage colours.

Martin spent his first three years in the company of his mother, grandparents Stuart and Vega Ritchie and their home-helps – cook, maid, gardener-chauffeur and Martin’s 19-year old nanny Roma Leonard (‘Nursy’). These were the most significant adults in Martin’s early life. (5)

The Ritchie surname appears in both Martin’s mother and his father’s family. They are not connected. His mother’s Ritchie line is Scottish, his father’s is Irish. The Northern Irish Ritchies established in Bega NSW in the 1850s. Whereas from his mother’s Scottish line, Martin’s great-grandfather James Ritchie and brother, came to Australia with enough funds to start a tool-making business, making ploughs and farm equipment. The Ritchie Bros succeeded very quickly. In 1900 James Ritchie purchased a superb property called Telford, with absolute water frontage at the Royal National Park, Port Hacking.

After James’ passing, his only son Stuart inherited everything and Stuart always improved massively on everything he touched. He transformed Telford into a grand residence and expanded Ritchie Bros into a major manufacturing and engineering firm. Located at Auburn, he built rails and carriages for NSW Rail. BHP was among Stuart’s directorships (Commonwealth Steel Newcastle). It provided one-third of the Trans-Australia rail lines across the Nullarbor and a quarter of the steel used to erect the Sydney Harbour Bridge.

After his marriage to Vega (Vee) Kopson, a Swedish-Australian, Stuart and Vee settled in 105 The Boulevarde Strathfield where Martin’s mother Joan (b. 1915) was raised and schooled at the local Meridan Girls College. Shortly before the Second World War, Stuart bought Wirian (3 Victoria Road, Bellevue Hill) located next door to Cranbrook School, which Martin and many Sharp relatives attended.

Says Martin, ‘I’m not sure what Wirian means. The closest I’ve got is David Gulpilil – the wonderful actor – said it was the name of the tribe that lived around here. The house was built in 1920 and my grandparents and my mother moved here in 1937. I grew up there as a baby during the Second World War.’ (6)

Henry returned from the war in 1945. Jo had married a doctor but a Flight-Lieutenant came home. Martin recalls, ‘I remember the day he came back. I was about 3½. He was lying on the floor. He and my mother were loving and cooing while I was wondering, “Who’s this guy? He’s a bit fat. He’s got hairy underarms…” (that sort of thing). Anyway, he was my Dad!

‘When my father came back he didn’t really connect with me. I think my mother knew him well but I didn’t know who he was and in a strange way he never changed much from that person. He was always with adults and found it difficult dealing with children. He didn’t like me as a baby. I don’t get that feeling – he holds me up in a picture and sniffs my bottom. My mother said, “your father never liked children”.

‘My mother would’ve loved more children but she got sick. She got a staphylococcal throat. He came back from the war with something that infected her. So I think the war indirectly poisoned her health.’ (7)

But the lounge parties continued – attended by socialites and sometimes celebrities. ‘Cocktail parties were it,’ says Martin. ‘You never had such civilized, lovely people. The jabber of voices, the drinks, someone at the piano playing, it was a lovely thing but you’d never get the idea they’d been to a war and lost half their friends. You can imagine coming from the Battle of Britain to Bellevue Hill and trying to get back into civilian life!’ (8)

On his return, Henry served in the RAAF section of Concord Hospital and later as Deputy Principal Medical Officer Eastern Area, NSW. In 1945-1946 he went away again, to serve as Principal Medical Officer in South Australia. His enlistment had committed him to a further 12 months after the end of the war.

Also back from the war was a group of artists who became known as the Merioola group. Merioola was a colonial mansion-cum-boarding house on Edgecliff Road Edgecliff, walking distance from Wirian. It was managed by Melbourne chatelaine Chica Lowe who encouraged artists, dancers, writers and theatre people to take up residence and form an artistic community. Artists included Donald Friend, Margaret Olley, Harry Tatlock Miller, Arthur Fleischmann and Justin O’Brien.

Jo knew Justin from the days when she had enrolled at the Julian Ashton Art School. She rekindled those art contacts while Henry was in South Australia. (9)

Henry came home proper in 1946 and stayed put, having served for the duration of the war plus the requisite 12 months. For the married couple, Grandfather Stuart purchased 25 Cranbrook Lane, Bellevue Hill, who moved in with 4-year old Martin. Henry returned to General Practice and started his academic work in dermatology, studying late in the room next to Martin’s bedroom.

Martin recalls their family unit of three, plus maid and a nanny, ‘When Dad came back there was a maid called Francis who he’d inherited from his Bega relatives. She was very old. My mother didn’t like having her there. She couldn’t eat her food. She used to spoon it into all the pewter jugs that were around, which was all right until the mould came out. Francis found the food had been dumped while my mother was getting thinner and thinner!’

Henry played his part in family life, enjoying cocktail parties and family get-togethers where Martin says, ‘Henry loved playing piano badly, singing music hall and Gilbert & Sullivan songs’. He bought a beautiful AWA walnut veneer radiogram to play his 78 records. He also made home movies and bought a sloop, Epacris.

Martin’s paternal grandfather, Dr Walter Ramsay Sharp was a leader in his church community, an Alderman on the Vaucluse Council and an outstanding doctor. He died three years before Martin was born, leaving his wife Elizabeth Mary Alexander (known as Bessie) an independent income, three properties (including a Sharp holiday home in Bowral) two beautiful daughters and three handsome sons – all doctors – over whom she had a controlling hand. Martin recalls, ‘She was in some ways quite severe’. From Bessie’s five children – Henry, Alan & Katherine (twins), Frank and Elizabeth – came 16 Sharp grandchildren. Bessie made a point of treating all her grandchildren equally. Still, Martin was proud to be the firstborn son of Gay’s firstborn son. Conversely, on his Ritchie side Martin had no cousins. He was the only grandchild. This drew him to his Mother’s side, especially in his childhood. Martin explains, ‘I was the child of Jo my mother and I had to be.

‘Although my mother tried very well to make me happy, I didn’t grow up in a happy home. My father was very good at some things, we used to go to Port Hacking when things were going well.’ (10)

Martin often spent his days going for walks with Jo around the suburb. They would regularly call on his grandparents at Wirian. Jo was always smartly dressed. (11)

Martin’s earliest pieces include a letter ‘To Mrs Sharp’ and a ‘Happy Easter’ message. He wrote the following story: ‘I am a wild bird and this is my story. I was born in a nest, in a tree near a church. My mother a pretty brown bird was soon able to fly. It was a joy to stand on the roof, to turn in the…’.

Another piece was based on his mother’s sketch. It read: ‘That morning as the ship left port a rainbow was seen in the sky an hour later. And it grew so dark that it soon lost sight of the coast. We had not even passed the cape before the storm struck us. It was so sudden.’

‘My mother got me my first paints’, said Martin. ‘In fact she kept my first drawing. It’s in a letter she sent to my father, Martin’s First Drawing. He replied, “It’s an animal. I don’t know what sort though...” (a comment like that). I think all kids like to draw – as soon as you get a pencil and a bit of paper! I was always encouraged by my mother.’ (12)

But for his parents’ deteriorating relationship, Martin would have enjoyed an idyllic childhood. Instead, the fights, separations and ensuing divorce became a core of unhappiness that Martin would bear all his life.

Forever after he would idealise his parents’ courtship: how they met in 1937 on a P&O liner traveling to London when Jo accompanied her parents to the coronation of King George VI. She – the beautiful wealthy heiress and Henry the dashing ship’s doctor. Martin would treasure his mother’s letters, describing the shipboard romance, the sites of London, and their theme song, ‘that certain night’, A Nightingale Sang in Berkeley Square. (13)

Sadly, Henry and Jo’s marriage ‘didn’t get going after the war’, said Martin. ‘They worked very hard at it. I blame it on Hitler rather than anything else. To be a doctor is a very tough job. My mother was very supportive, she did everything she could’. (14)

He clarified, ‘I think they were very keen on each other when they were young. Even the early marriage was good enough until Dad went away. I think they were comfortable. They both regret they didn’t get married at that time but they waited. Then it all goes into letters. Until I read the letters, I never had any idea of how keen they were on each other. I can’t imagine it from what I knew of them. I never saw them “in love” really. (I did actually, but only briefly).

‘I think it was pretty tight after the war. They never quite got back those three years. I reckon it was difficult from then on. I can remember them fighting – shouting, shouting, and my mother saying, “Not in front of the child!” but it didn’t stop. I can remember that sentence amidst all of this’. (15)

Both parents struggled to make the marriage work and Martin’s grandfather was determined that it must. Henry, somewhat awkwardly played the fatherly role – swimming and fishing with Martin, sometimes reciting him poems but usually he was not around or not available. Henry worked all day in his medical practice and closed himself away at night, studying for his Diploma in Dermatological Medicine.

Martin’s response was to retreat into himself or spend time with his mother and Ritchie grandparents. He enjoyed his first trip to the cinema with Jo to see Disney’s Pinocchio. She had no difficulty being a loving mother and dutiful wife. She embroidered and made collages cut from magazines. Martin copied her. He made collages and drew pictures, many of whic...

Table of contents

• 1. THE LITTLE PRINCE
• 2. ART FATHER
• 3. ARTY WILD BOYS
• 4. OZ IS A NEW MAGAZINE
• 5. OZ TRIAL LONDON CALLING
• 6. FRESHER CREAM
• 7. ART OF POP
• 8. MUYBRIDGE, VINCENT, MAGRITTE & TINY TIM
• 9. ART ABOUT ART
• 10. UNDERGROUND MEETS UNDERWORLD
• 11. THE YELLOW HOUSE
• 12. YESTERDAY’S PAPERS
• 13. COUNTERCULTURE GOES MAINSTREAM
• 14. OUT & ABOUT IN PARIS & LONDON
• 15. PREPARING FOR TINY
• 16. KOLD KOMFORT
• 17 STREET OF DREAMS PRODUCTIONS
• 18. REVENGE OF THE CLOWNING CALAVERAS
• INDEX