rolf harris
of paper and I couldn’t fit his head in, so I had to get his head leaning down. So I put a watch in his hand and had him bending to look at that watch.” After an idyllic sounding childhood in a suburb of
Perth in western Australia, Rolf’s ambitions went beyond simply studying in Sydney. “My mum and dad always felt that London was the hub of the universe and they instilled that in me: ‘If you want to go where everything is best, go to London.’” The other reason, he admits with a chuckle, was to
cut himself from his mother’s apron strings. He relied on his mother to do everything for him, right down to writing business letters. He believes if he’d stayed in Australia, he would have boarded with one of his aunts and never learned to stand on his own two feet. Nevertheless, the City and Guilds of London Art
School was, he says, the biggest let down of his life because he felt it didn’t focus enough on what he wanted to study: portraiture. His grandfather had been a portrait painter and Rolf desperately wanted to follow in his footsteps, despite warnings that he’d always be broke: “My father was mad-keen [on me becoming a portrait painter], although his father had always said it’s degrading begging people to buy your work – get a real job.” Forbidden by his own father from becoming an artist,
Rolf’s dad bent over backwards for his son. “I had the support of my dad the entire time. He got me the best materials: Winsor & Newton watercolours. I started on watercolour but oils are much easier.” When he was starting out, Rolf would often draw
people while they were asleep on the bus or window shopping. Now most of his work is based on photos but he is a prolific planner and he says he can picture in his mind exactly how each painting will turn out. “I clearly see a sequence of how I need to put it on the canvas.” Rolf’s TV career has often drawn on his versatile
skills, from the child-friendly Rolf’s Cartoon Club to the Old Master tributes in Rolf on Art. The 2010 BBC Arena documentary, Rolf Harris Paints His Dream, filmed the artist painting five women, including actress Dervla Kirwan and model Lily Cole, in a series of works inspired by Shakespeare’s Midsummer Night’s Dream. These various shows have revealed the speed with which Rolf is capable of painting, as he would regularly
ABOVE Rolf is all smiles at Clarendon Fine Art BELOW My Dad, oil on canvas BOTTOM The Lion King, Uneasy Truce, oil on canvas
complete a three-metre wide canvas in a matter of minutes. “People don’t see the work that goes into it,” says Rolf. “With all of those paintings, I used to rehearse them five or six times. I had to practise so much because producers were always telling me to lose a minute or two. I’d often have to get rid of a colour and start again.” Endless TV commitments have meant Rolf hasn’t
always been able to do much in the way of personal work but more recently he has taken to painting every morning, working at fever pitch from 6am until 10am. “I don’t get much joy out of working slower,” he says. “I would rather get on with it.” Enjoying a challenge is central to Rolf’s art and he
says he cannot remember finding anything too difficult to take on, although his commission to paint The Queen for her 80th birthday in 2005 was a different story – find out more on page 28. Made a CBE in The Queen’s 2006 birthday honours list, Rolf is looking forward to the Diamond Jubilee celebrations in June, having attended the original coronation in 1953, “singing Waltzing Matilda to anyone who would stop”. Rolf’s Queen Elizabeth II portrait will feature in his
retrospective but typically, he is equally excited to rediscover his less celebrated works that have since languished in private collections. “It’s marvellous,” he says. “I have a vivid memory of the painting process and I can remember individual works in great detail. It will be very thrilling and nostalgic to see them all again.” So Rolf can draw and paint like a master; he can sing,
make people laugh and charm monarchs; he was even crowned West Australian state swimming champion in his teens, which all begs the question: is there anything this man can’t do? “Dancing and skiing,” he chuckles. “I’ve got two left
feet and no muscles on the inside of my legs, so I think I’m in the right place with a brush in my hand.” Rolf Harris: Can You Tell What It Is Yet? runs from 19 May to 12 August at Walker Art Gallery, Liverpool.
www.liverpoolmuseums.org.uk/walker
Artists & Illustrators 21
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