Vicki Varvaressos Frank Watters

Predominantly a figurative and abstract painter, Vicki Varvaressos was hard-up when she decided to enter one of her first portraits into the Archibald Prize, hopeful she might win the prize money.

The subject is Frank Watters (1934–2020), a passionate and influential art dealer and co-director of Watters Gallery, which was a stalwart of the Sydney art scene from 1964. Varvaressos held her first solo show at the gallery in 1975 and remained part of its stable of artists.

In 2020, Varvaressos wrote about the work: ‘I painted Frank in his apartment. He had just had his chair upholstered and I included a few of his many colourful objects. His walls (until recently) were always painted pink. When I was reminded of this painting decades later, I was surprised at the bright colours as I often am when seeing my early work. I was also struck by the slightly melancholic air about Frank. Although I had not been aware of it at the time, I later came to think that it captured something about him.’

This work is now in the collection of the Art Gallery of New South Wales.