The art of being an artist in Silverton

I have already mentioned the artists in Broken Hill. Today we visited the late, great Pro Hart art gallery. He used to collect Rolls Royces (saw four of them in the driveway) and also Picassos and Rembrandts (saw one of each of those). Silverton is a tiny town about 30km out of Broken Hill. A collection of little art galleries, this little place is full of artists and memorabilia. The movies, Mad Max 2 and A Town Like Alice, to name just two were filmed out here. We looked at the Mad Max Museum from the front. The entry fee didn't seem worth it really. The memorabilia? Well take it or leave it. Have to say being in a room with 200 dolls staring at you was a bit unsettling, and I'm sure I've seen a horror movie at some point somewhat along those lines. Monsieur bought me a lovely plate. Lee Fabbian, the artist who works with the glass is amazing. She removes the base from her kiln and works the glass from underneath. The plate I really liked was red (and found out later that it contained gold dust as well). I've done a bit of leadlighting in my day and I know that red glass is expensive so most people use it very sparingly. Add the gold dust and you have a plate that is over $200. A bit out of my pocket, so monsieur splashed out and bought me this nice little plate for around $60. And added bonus, something went wrong with the EFTPOS machine, and Monsieur fixed it! For that good deed we got given a nice little Silverton sticker.

 

My favourite place was the John Dynon art gallery. This place was a little gem in the desert. Loved his paintings, but could only afford to buy a few printed post cards. I got five of them, handed over my 10 bucks and he gave me a signed postcard of the emu. Nice! This guy gets around. He had pictures up there of him with Jeff Fenech (the boxer, remember, I love yous all), Barry Crocker and wow, he even once shook hands with Fergie (no, not the singer, the ex royal ex wife of Prince Andrew) He also mentioned that I'd just shouted him a couple of beers, although he's not sure if he should be drinking these days – says he doesn't remember much about it but he did say that his wife make sure he knows all about it! Really loved his beer garden made out of bicycles.

 

 

 

 

 

And the car, yes we saw a lot of those. Seems that if something stands still long enough out here they will paint it.