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Posted: 2022-06-04 06:55:00

Curator Nick Waterlow marked my university dissertation, mentored me and guided my thinking about the commissioning of art. In 2009 he asked me to curate a show at UNSW Galleries in Sydney. He was tragically killed a few days after opening night.

At Nick’s funeral, his partner found a page from his notebook where he had written his curator’s last will and testament. I framed it and keep it above my desk. Nick lists seven things, three which I hold close: passion, an ability to be uncertain, and a belief in the necessity of art and artists.

“Nick lists seven things, three which I hold close: passion, an ability to be uncertain, and a belief in the necessity of art and artists.”

I met artist Marco Fusinato in 1999, when I wrote about an art and sound show he did with Sonic Youth’s Thurston Moore. I was intimidated at first. We first worked together in the mid-2000s when I lived in Melbourne and invited him to co-curate an exhibition of sound art.

Marco’s show Desastres, now at the Venice Biennale, was years in the making. We agreed that our underlying principle was “friends at the beginning and friends at the end”. Our friendship is built on shared ambition and laughter.

I have been married and divorced, in a de facto relationship, and I am currently single. I got married in my 30s. I was unable to carry a baby full term and struggled for years with the grief of IVF and miscarriages.

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From my former de facto, I live with my spirited youngest stepdaughter Serina King, aged 22, and our imperious cat Kimmy. I also have a beautiful 27-year-old stepdaughter, Sophie King. She met her husband, Liam Brown, at the age of 14 on a school bus. They wanted to marry at 21 and I organised the wedding with a reception at Artspace. I admire this generation of young men. Liam is creative, thoughtful and self-aware. They are a special couple.

I think marriage is a beautiful act of hope and I would happily to do it all again. But if not, that’s fine too. Love and hope are two things which are in rich abundance and entwined in all facets of my life, always.

To read more from Sunday Life magazine, click here.

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