SMH: Wendy Whiteley’s second gift: ‘The time has come to give women a bit of attention’
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SMH: Wendy Whiteley’s second gift: ‘The time has come to give women a bit of attention’
Article by: Linda Morris. Photo: Wendy Whiteley with Steven Alderton, CEO of the National Art School.
Wendy Whiteley was 15 when she dropped out of Hornsby Girls High to enrol in art school. She stayed about a year at East Sydney Technical College, in Darlinghurst, eventually following her prodigiously talented boyfriend to Italy. The rest, as they say, is Australian art history.
More than six decades later, Whiteley has made a $500,000 promised bequest to her alma mater, now the National Art School (NAS) – among the largest gifts the institution has received.
“I’m trying to tidy up loose ends towards the end of my life because I don’t want to leave another mess,” Whiteley says. “There’s been enough messes around Whiteley wills.”
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Wednesday 23 September 2026
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Wednesday 23 September 2026
Please see below for current and forthcoming exhibitions and events featuring our staff and alumni. Oliver Abbott: Guide Alum Oliver Abbott (MFA, 2024) presents Guide at Dominik Mersch Gallery, Sydney. “Guide continues an ongoing investigation into a synthesised world. I glean fragments of architecture, infrastructure and landscape, rebuild and reconfigure them, and navigate the new space …
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