00:00I'm completely blown away. I still don't really know. I don't know where I am, which
00:07way is up or down. Yeah, I'm absolutely thrilled.
00:10Well, it's great news. So talk us through the painting then, which is just over your
00:15left shoulder. Why did you choose to paint your friend Justine in the way you have?
00:22Sure. So her name is Justine Williams and she's one of Australia's most amazing sculpture
00:28and performance artists. Justine has this way about her, anybody who knows Justine, where
00:35on the one hand, she's an incredibly intense person and any interaction with Justine, you'll
00:41experience that intensity. And at the same time, she has this sort of otherworldly aspect to
00:46her. And you can see in her practice that she's created all sorts of things, everything she
00:51uses, everything from car bodies to televisions to opera singers. So there's a real larger
00:56than life aspect of her practice as well. And so I wanted to make a painting that really
01:01captured that, that showed Justine as a kind of conjurer of an incredible creative universe
01:09or multiverse of work.
01:11Which is the title of the work.
01:15That's right. So it was, the title of the work is Flagship Mother Multiverse. And Flagship
01:23Mother came from one of Justine's performances that was called Making Do Rhymes With Pooh that
01:31she performed in New Zealand earlier this year. And it was all about women's labor and the labor
01:36of trying to, you know, have a creative career and work a day job and look after the family and
01:41all of that stuff. And so you'll see in the painting, in the lower left hand corner, you
01:45can see a painting also of Justine's daughter, Honour, looking up at her mother and wondering,
01:52you know, almost admiring Justine at the same time thinking, okay, am I going to have to
01:56handle all this as well?
01:58How long did it take to paint, Julie?
02:02It was three months, a really solid three months. So I made a decision. I haven't entered
02:07the Archibald every year because it's a time consuming thing if you're going to do a good
02:11job of it. But I decided to set aside the three months and to dedicate that completely
02:16to making this work. And I did. And I'm really, really pleased I did, obviously.
02:20Well, you won the Archibald. Does Justine like the painting?
02:25She absolutely loves it. She saw it. You can hear her laughing in the background. She saw
02:30it for the first time actually today. So she was the dream subject that she didn't want
02:37to see the painting, didn't want to see how it was being developed and was just very,
02:40she trusted me completely and was very pleased to see the end product.
02:44So what does it mean to win the Archibald for you if the news has sunk in yet? It's not
02:49just the cash prize, is it? It's the prestige as well.
02:53Yeah, it's incredibly prestigious. The Art Gallery of New South Wales is, you know, a peak arts
03:00organisation in Australia and, you know, has a very special place in my heart. I was first
03:06shown here in Art Express many years ago. So to have that validation and the support from
03:11the trustees and also from peers of mine who are trustees as well, that's incredible. You
03:18can't put a price actually on just how meaningful that is. And I was saying to somebody earlier,
03:23I think, you know, winning this prize in your 20s would be very exciting. And I was in the
03:28Archibald prize in my 20s. But I'm so pleased in a way that all these decades later that I've
03:35been able to win it now, it feels incredibly meaningful after a long career as a painter.
03:40So how are you planning to celebrate?
03:44I think Justine would like to go and get something sparkling and alcoholic to drink and
03:49then I'm not sure what will happen after that and return for the opening later.
03:53Okay. Does she get to keep the painting, Julie?
03:56No, no, she doesn't get to keep the painting.
04:01Okay.
04:01Unless she buys it, maybe.
04:03Okay.
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