Dick Watkins Rollin Schlicht

For 33 years Dick Watkins and architect and painter Rollin Schlicht have enjoyed each other’s company, talking frequently together about art.

“He’s got a good strong face of great character, so in a way it was easy though I did have to struggle a bit to get a likeness,” says Watkins. The scale of Schlicht’s paintings and his use of asymmetric shapes and flat, primary colours has been compared to Matisse but Watkins felt that black and white would be just as effective for Schlicht’s portrait. “And he is a black and white sort of character, with very strong opinions about things.”

Born in Sydney in 1937, Dick Watkins is a largely self taught artist, although he occasionally attended the Julian Ashton School and East Sydney Technical College between 1955 and 1958. He was selected for all Archibald, Wynne and Sulman Prizes in 1995.