Page 2267 - Week 08 - Wednesday, 4 August 2021
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room through many years of commonwealth Senate estimates, and it has left a permanent impression on me.
Notably, Mandy’s work is held in most of the major state and regional galleries in Australia, including the National Gallery of Australia, the Art Gallery of New South Wales, the National Gallery of Victoria, the National Gallery of Western Australia, the National Portrait Gallery, Australian Parliament House and the Australian War Memorial. Her work has also been collected internationally by the Guggenheim Museum, New York; the Los Angeles Museum of Contemporary Art; and the Nevada Museum of Art in Reno.
Mandy was not only a high-profile artist nationally and internationally; she also had a talent for bringing together thinkers from a range of disciplines to consider pressing issues. She would gather traditional owners, artists, scientists and educators to use their various skills to highlight pressures on the community and the country. She was a committed collaborator and believed that by sharing these endeavours she harnessed the collective power to generate the best ideas.
In later years she also collaborated with her son and daughter, who, as I mentioned, are both respected artists in their own right. In 1995, Mandy moved to Central West New South Wales, where she lived with her husband, Dr Guy Fitzhardinge. In this setting, Mandy’s work referenced the effects of drought, energy generation, coal and gold mining on the land, and the associated threat to endangered ecological communities. Here she continued to make prolific contributions to the ongoing discourse on the current climate emergency.
Mandy was a lecturer at the ANU School of Art for an astonishing 25 years, where she mentored multiple generations of artists. She is remembered for being a teacher who set high standards for herself and her students. She was an inspiration in her fierce dedication to causes and her talent in communicating these in her work. One of Mandy’s legacies is inspiring a passion for art and its potential in her students. In 2008 Mandy was appointed as an adjunct professor in the Fenner School of Environment and Society at the Australian National University here in Canberra. Mandy leaves a lasting legacy as a politically and socially engaged artist; an environmental campaigner; a generous and inspiring teacher, partner and parent; and a skilled and passionate collaborator dedicated to influencing change. Her obituary by Sasha Grishin reads:
She felt strongly that it is the role of the artist to inspire others to join in the struggle to restore our faith in the dignity of people and the sacredness of country.
Mandy remained active in the studio until the very end, and her final large-scale collaborative work will premiere in Australia in November this year. Her legacy will live on in so many ways, not least through an artist grant to be named in her honour, which will support creative responses to the climate crisis. It is with the deepest respect that we honour and celebrate her deep passion, ethics and enormous contribution to the arts. We are so lucky as a community to have been able to know and to experience Mandy Martin and to continue to learn from her through the
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