About Ellen Waugh OAM (13 March 1924 - 18 January 2024):

Born in Canowindra, her schooling commenced in 1931 at a “depressing” two-teacher school just across the Queensland border in Wallangarra, where her father worked as a railway clerk. An early artistic memory, around age 7, was admiring Aboriginal rock carvings near her grandmother’s home at Narrabeen.

The family arrived in Sydney in 1937 and built their new home in South Coogee in 1939. It was to be Ellen’s home for the next 85 years.

At Sydney Girls’ High School, where art was not offered, she was encouraged to pursue science at Sydney University. After advice that the Education Department funded place in the science course would “go to a man”, she commenced at Sydney Teachers College in 1942 and, on her afternoons off, attended Phyllis Shillito’s School of Design. In 1945, Ellen qualified for the newly introduced Art Diploma at the National Art School and became one of the first two High School art teachers appointed in NSW in 1946.

She became a lecturer in art at the Sydney Teachers College, before going on to the Teachers Colleges at Wagga Wagga in 1948 and Bathurst in 1951. At Bathurst, she took an after-school art class at Scots School, which included the young Brett Whiteley (1939-1992).

Ellen returned to Sydney in 1957 and commenced lecturing at Alexander Mackie College in 1958, where, over the next 20 years, she taught a generation of High School art teachers, including Geoffrey Bardon (1940-2003), the encourager of the Western Desert Aboriginal art movement.

She travelled extensively throughout her life, visiting around 30 countries, to support her professional and artistic development and to gain an understanding of other cultures. In Australia, she supported indigenous causes and art. She also contributed greatly to the Randwick community, chiefly through the Randwick and District Historical Society.

Through all this, she continued to make art, although as a ‘woman’ and a ‘teacher’, she was too unassuming to promote herself as a serious artist. She was also an avid art collector throughout her life and donated pieces to numerous cultural institutions, including Cossington-Smith’s “The Bridge in Building”, now a mainstay of the National Gallery of Australia’s collection. Ellen was the secretary/executive director of the Blake Prize for two decades.

In 2019, a lifetime of service was recognised with an Order of Australia Medal for “service to community history, and to arts education”.

The exhibition has been curated by Emeritus Professor Ian Howard of the School of Art & Design, UNSW, who was taught by Ellen in the 1960s, and Joseph Waugh, her closest surviving relative.