Robin Lawrence Andrea Durbach

Andrea Durbach is a writer and human rights lawyer whom Robin Lawrence has known for some years. Born in South Africa, she grew up in Cape Town where she became a civil rights lawyer involved in the anti-Apartheid struggle. She moved to Sydney in 1989.

It was at the launch of Durbach’s recent book Uppington, about her experience defending 25 black South Africans accused of murder in a riot, that Lawrence decided she had to paint the author. ‘She looked so tremendous standing there so sternly,’ says Lawrence. Initially she tried to recreate that pose but as the painting evolved the pose changed totally. However, Lawrence still wanted to capture ‘the strength, straight-forwardness and seriousness of a person deeply involved with her work.’

Born in Sydney in 1935, Lawrence studied Fine Arts at the National Art School. She has lived in many parts of the world including New Zealand, London, Florence and Salzburg where for a time she studied under Oskar Kokoschka. She returned to Sydney in 1986 after 22 years teaching, painting and exhibiting in New York where she was the head of art at the Steiner School. This is the first time she has been hung in the Archibald Prize.