Patrick Hockey
Patrick William Hockey
Born(1948-10-19)19 October 1948
Abercorn, Queensland
Died30 June 1992(1992-06-30) (aged 43)
London, England
Resting placeMundoolun, Logan City, Queensland
EducationBrisbane Church of England Grammar
Known forPainting: landscape, still life, murals
StyleLyrical realism
SpouseMargaret De Burgh Hockey
Parents
  • Max Hockey (father)
  • Helen Irene Beatrice "Nell" Hockey (née Hamilton) (mother)

Patrick William Hockey (1948–1992) was an Australian grazier, writer, and painter of landscapes and urban environments.[1]

Early life

Patrick Hockey was born on 19 October 1948,[2] in Abercorn, Queensland to Nell and Max Hockey, and was brother to David and Heather. His upbringing on his family's 26,000 hectare cattle station 'Abercorn' was to influence the subject matter and style of his future painting.[3] He was educated at Abercorn Primary School and Brisbane Church of England Grammar. Attending a summer school at the University of New England taught by Stan Rapotec aroused his interest in painting.[4]

Hockey's art first came to attention for his entry in the 1972 $7,500 Travelodge Art Prize in Canberra,[5] when Guy Grey-Smith, reviewing the show in The Canberra Times described how "the warmth of country faces the obscenity of the city [in] the red brown earth of Patrick Hockey".[6] To Shiela Scotter, Hockey described himself as being "from no particular school - I've just always wanted to paint,"[7] and took pride in being self-taught.[8]

Exhibiting artist and socialite

Granted two years off after jackarooing at the cattle station for seven years,[9] and with a round-the-world ticket given him by his father with his blessing,[10] Hockey traveled to London at age twenty-four. There, his flamboyant paintings and murals in house-paints, acrylics and watercolour[4][9] came to prominence after Redfern Gallery exhibited it in 1975 at the Royal Court Theatre of Queensland House in Sloane Square, London,[7] and from April that year he was then represented by Holdsworth galleries in Sydney, then later by Lister and Greenhill galleries in Perth, and Philip Bacon gallery in Brisbane.[11][9]

In 1979 he met art collector Evelyn Lambert in Venice, and spent time with Viscountess Rothermere in Monte Carlo,[12] returning in 1980 to enjoy the Sydney social scene.[13][14] In March 1982 his name appeared on the National Trust's full-page advertisement in The Sydney Morning Herald signed by 93 high-profile citizens protesting the demolition of the Rural Bank Building, Martin Place.[15][16][17] Also in the 1980s June McCallum, editor-in-chief of Vogue Australia, commissioned Hockey to write up his world travels.[18]

In 1985 he joined Karen Knight-Mudie, John Rigby, Robert Jacks, Victor Majzner, Sally Robinson, George Chaloupka, Wendy Flynn, Allan Howard, with organiser Frank Hodgkinson in the art camp in Arnhem Land under the Northern Territory Museum of Arts and Sciences 'Artists in the Field' program.[19]

Carolyn Soutar in her biography of Dave Allen describes a meal at The Golden Century in Sydney "which ended up with Patrick Hockey and Dave taking all the clutter off the table and turning the tablecloth into this huge piece of art. Everyone piled in and drew on it as well. Between the soy-sauce stains and the wonderful artwork by Patrick and Dave it was really stunning. Dave finished the evening by walking out of the restaurant wrapped in this tablecloth, wearing it like a toga."[20] Amongst other venues, Hockey's paintings decorated Kable's restaurant in the Regent Hotel in Sydney, commissioned by its manager Ted Wright.[21]

By 1988 he counted amongst his clients Alan Bond, Susan Renouf, and Kerry Packer.[10] On his own account Hockey said he enjoyed the social life, "though I don't go out half as much as people think and for half the year [at Beaudesert] I'm off the drink and I work seven days a week." Asked if "reverse snobbery" had impeded his career he conceded that it had in artistic circles, but not monetarily, and that "in the bush" his success was admired.[10]

Hockey's later focus was on interiors, still lifes with sea shells and, inspired by a commission from Susan Renouf, floral works.[22][23] He was art director for the film The Last Tango with Rudolph Valentino set in Sydney in 1975,[24] about a woman so obsessed with Valentino that she kept a shrine to him in her house.[25]

Reception

Terry Ingram, noting in Art & Australia the doldrums in the art market of early 1990 remarked that, nevertheless:

[...] isolated rashes of red stickers went up around Sydney and Melbourne galleries, mostly because the dealers had the good sense to show recession-proof work — pretty, escapist pictures or works by artists who have a special following, or both: Patrick Hockey, at Holdsworth Galleries and Frances Jones, who paints bowls of fruit, at Eddie Glastra's.[26]

Columnist Sally Loane remarked in 1992 that "to his detractors in the gossipy art and social world, Patrick Hockey was a dilettante, his art dismissed as decorative. The serious art circles scoffed at his constant appearances in the social pages and the fact that his art was almost always linked with the rich and famous."[18] To interviewer Geraldine O'Brien he remarked that he knew:

...artists who say they only sell to the public collections — which, of course, is where posterity lies. But I'm not part of the power clique of the art world, of the curators and critics, though I think I am in a way as serious as someone more obviously 'serious'. I just paint what I fancy, what I feel like painting. I'm not sure that 'seriousness' is necessary for an artist, anyway. I've not the time to do all that suffering.[10]

Comparing Hockey and John Nixon's 1988 exhibitions at Holdsworth Galleries and Roslyn Oxley's respectively, Sydney Morning Herald critic John McDonald defended Hockey against a perceived lack of 'seriousness':

It's quite easy to sympathise Hockey's ideas about 'seriousness'. Since he works hard at his painting, since many people buy his works and obviously get pleasure from them, who is to say that Hockey is any less serious an artist than Nixon? Is a work automatically more serious if it looks cheap instead of expensive, if it pays lip-service to modernist heroes like Malevich and is accompanied by a catalogue statement chiefly distinguished by its contempt for syntax? The difference is obviously one of milieu, yet in his hedonism and his taste for decorative painting, Hockey is being undeniably true to himself. He doesn't pretend to be changing the world and would probably find Nixon's brand of pseudo-spiritual asceticism quite repugnant. Where Hockey wants to please the viewer, Nixon sets out to chasten him or her.[27]

McDonald's review, as Tim Bonyhady notes,[28] brought protests, ignored by The Herald, from Tony Bond, the curator of contemporary art at the Art Gallery of New South Wales, and Paul Foss and Paul Taylor of Art and Text. Artist Mike Parr published a rejoinder in Agenda in August, finding that Hockey was 'strictly incommensurable' against the superior Nixon, and a rumour spread that a dead cockroach had been mailed to McDonald, who accused Nixon.

Personal life

Nindooinbah Homestead (2009)
Reina Irmer (n.d.). Walkway leading to the teahouse on the lake at Nindooinbah homestead, Beaudesert district, Queensland.

On 10 March 1983 Hockey married (Beryl) Margaret (de Burgh Persse) in front of guests Tim Storrier, Donald Friend, model Penelope Tree, Sir lan and Lady Potter, Leo Schofield, Caroline and John Laws, actress Carmen Duncan, Harry M. Miller, jeweller Tony White and former Brisbane Lord Mayor Sallyanne Atkinson. Artist Donald Friend described how for the wedding ceremony:

We drove to Beaudesert and out a few miles to the St Johns Church, Mundoolun. The occasion was one that had been much gossiped about for months—the marriage of Patrick Hockey (a rich very gay society man—a sort of butterfly in a Rolls Royce: a terribly fashionable painter; an amiable sort of nonsense person) to Margaret de Burgh Persse, heiress to a vast fortune and one of the great pioneer cattle stations. It was a most elaborate affair. Three hundred guests had been invited to the ceremony and to the reception afterwards at a marvellous old-style homestead [Nindooinbah] kept up still as it would have been fifty years ago, set in a grand garden embowered in azaleas.[29]

They settled in and restored her ancestral home Nindooinbah House in Beaudesert.[30] The couple spent periods apart, and his bisexuality was neither kept secret nor broadcast. Margaret remembered how he loved women; "he was very much a man for all seasons. Whatever company he was in, he enjoyed...It was a great privilege to be married to him"[18] In the grounds he created his studio in a vernacular Australian style and designed a tea house inspired by the Willow Pattern,[31][32] and in the homestead Hockey displayed his work.[33] Never relinquishing his inherited occupation as a grazier, he fattened the cattle from his own Queensland estate on the property,[34][4] commuting from his mural-decorated former boarding house in an 1859 Surry Hillsterrace,[35] purchased in 1976,[36] to do so.[10][9]

Death

Having discovered that he was infected with HIV and while taking a month-long trip with his sister Heather Stevens in England, which he had planned months ahead to see old friends, Hockey died in London aged forty-three, on 30 June 1992, of an AIDS-related illness.[8][37]

His wife Margaret remembered "He wanted to go with flags flying. He resented the idea of dying terribly. He didn't want to accept it. He loved life so much, he just wanted to go on living."[18]

His funeral service was held on 4 July at Christ Church St Laurence, George Street.[4][11][38] His estate was sold by Goodmans Auctions on 25 October 1993.[39]

Legacy

A posthumous survey of Hockey's work was written by friend and prominent art critic Sandra McGrath in 1994,[40] describing his "love of life" as "reflected in his paintings that straddled several contrasting worlds: the world of art and the world of commerce; the country and the city; the heterosexual and the homosexual; world of society and the world of the stockman; the loner and the bon vivant."[40] Margaret Hockey in 2000 was awarded a Medal of the Order of Australia for "service to the community, particularly through charitable organisations, the promotion of arts and crafts and the preservation of the local history of Beaudesert."[41]

Awards

  • 1974: Royal Agricultural Society of New South Wales Easter Show Art Prize, shared with Nance Lemerle[42][43]

Selected exhibitions

  • 1976, 6–24 April: Patrick Hockey and Louis Kahan, Holdsworth Galleries, Woollahra[44][45]
  • 1977, 26 July–13 August: George Hatsatouris, Patrick Hockey, Holdsworth Galleries
  • 1977, 2–20 December: Patrick Hockey. Philip Bacon Galleries, 2 Arthur Street, New Farm[46]
  • 1978, March–April: Patrick Hockey; Lilian Weinberg. Holdsworth Galleries[47]
  • 1979, 10–22 November: Christopher Boock; Patrick Hockey; Randwick Technical College jewellery. Holdsworth Galleries[48]
  • 1980, Redfern Galleries, London[49]
  • 1980, 24 November - 1 1 December: Patrick Hockey; Helen Finch. Holdsworth Galleries[49]
  • 1987, 5–22 January: Patrick Hockey, Paintings. Greenhill Galleries, Perth[50][51]
  • 1988, February: solo show, Holdsworth Galleries[10][27]
  • 1990, 3–21 February: solo show, Holdsworth Galleries[52][23][53]

Posthumous

Collections

References

  1. ^"Patrick Hockey: Australian Art and Artists file". State Library of Victoria. Retrieved 27 October 2025.
  2. ^General Register Office. England and Wales Civil Registration Indexes. London, United Kingdom; Volume: 15; Page: 1462
  3. ^Brown, Heather (7 February 1988). "Bright lights of a bush boy. Interview with Patrick Hockey". The Australian Good Weekend supplement. p. 5. ISSN 1038-8761.
  4. ^ abcde"Artist rose to world acclaim. Obituary: Patrick Hockey (1948–1992)". The Sydney Morning Herald. 2 July 1992. p. 6.
  5. ^Travelodge Art Prize, Travelodge Art Prize: Australian Gallery File, retrieved 27 October 2025
  6. ^Grey-Smith, Guy (28 October 1972). "ART Subliminal quality for the individual". The Canberra Times. Vol. 47, no. 13266. Australian Capital Territory, Australia. p. 15. Retrieved 27 October 2025 – via National Library of Australia.
  7. ^ abScotter, Sheila (10 December 1975). "Sheila Scotter suggests... A Cool Lunch on Christmas Day". The Australian Women's Weekly: 95.
  8. ^ ab"Man of the land and the arts. Obituary. Patrick Hockey 1948-1992". The Age. 2 July 1992. p. 16.
  9. ^ abcdWalford, Leslie (15 March 1978). "Painting a mural dream world". The Sydney Morning Herald. p. 20.
  10. ^ abcdefO'Brien, Geraldine (2 February 1988). "Hockey: just an artful grazier?". The Sydney Morning Herald. p. 12.
  11. ^ abcdefMcCulloch, Alan; McCulloch, Susan; McCulloch Childs, Emily (2006). The new McCulloch's encyclopedia of Australian art (4th ed.). Fitzroy, Vic: Aus Art Editions in association with The Miegunyah Press. p. 525. ISBN 978-0-522-85317-9.
  12. ^"Here, there & everywhere". The Australian Women's Weekly. Vol. 48, no. 6. Australia, Australia. 9 July 1980. p. 16. Retrieved 27 October 2025 – via National Library of Australia.
  13. ^"Here, there & everywhere". The Australian Women's Weekly. Vol. 47, no. 33. Australia, Australia. 16 January 1980. p. 17. Retrieved 27 October 2025 – via National Library of Australia.
  14. ^Beaumont, Janise (12 September 1982). "Around the traps: Peeking at Parky". The Sydney Morning Herald. p. 139.
  15. ^Glascott, Joseph (25 February 1982). "Art-deco view of architect's rally". The Sydney Morning Herald. p. 3.
  16. ^"[Advertisement] The State Bank demolishes more for you, perosnally - This Building Must Stay". The Sydney Morning Herald. 25 March 1982. p. 9.
  17. ^Signed by Nadine Amadio, Andrew Andersons, Alderman Stanley Ashmore-Smith, Douglass Baglin, Amina Belgiorno-Nettis, John Bell, Margaret Betteridge, Gay Bilson, Tony Bilson, Charles Blackman, Ron Blair, Dame Helen Blaxland, Maggie Blinco, James Broadbent, Martyn Chapman, Bill Collins, Sally Delafield Cook, William Delafield Cook, Anya Copeland, Keith Cottier, Lady Cotton, Philip Cox, Richard d'Apice, Maggie Dence, Primrose Dunlop, Max Dupain, David Ell, Len Evans, Leon Fink, Margaret Fink, Diana Fisher, Kate Fitzpatrick, Margaret Fulton, Don Gazzard, Philip Geeves, Robin Gibson, Rebecca Gilling, Jos Hackforth-Jones, Robert Haines, Professor John Haskell, Bebette Hayes, Patrick Hockey, Ken Horler, Lilian Horler, Mervyn Horton, Wendy Hughes, Alderman Mick Ibbet, Terry Ingram, Professor Peter Johnson, Jenny Kee, Professor Max Kelly, Clive Lucas, Ted Mack, Anne McCormick, Alderman Stephen McGoldrick, Alderman Michael Matthews, John Meillon, Harry Miller, Glenn Murcutt, Alderman Maureen Oliver, Margaret Olley, Megan Paris, Timothy Pascoe, Professor Neville Quarry, Lloyd Rees, Alderman Tony Reeves, Patricia Reid, Robyn Richards, Richard Rowe, Anne Schofield, Leo Schofield, Vincent Serventy, Philipp Short, Caroline Simpson, Rodney de Soos, John Spatchurst, David Spode, Peter Stanbury, Ian Stapleton, Caroline Storch, Peter Stronach, Maggie Tabberer, Howard Tanner, Robert Tickner, Bunty Turner, Thea Waddell, Nathan Waks, Leslie Walford, Patrick White, Brett Whiteley, Murray Wilcox, Ken Woolley, and Anna Volska.
  18. ^ abcdLoane, Sally (19 September 1992). "Life after Patrick. Margaret Hockey draws a portrait of the artist". Sydney Morning Herald Good Weekend supplement. pp. 32–37. ISSN 1323-1979.
  19. ^Jack-Hinton, Colin (Autumn 1987). "Commentary: The Northern Territory Museum of Arts and Sciences". Art and Australia. 24 (3): 323.
  20. ^Soutar, Carolyn (2006). Dave Allen: the biography. London: Orion. pp. 194–5. ISBN 978-0-7528-7775-4.
  21. ^Wexler, Madelin (1996). Dining in style: 50 great hotel restaurants of the world. Glen Cove, N.Y: Interior Details, an imprint of PBC International, Inc. p. 38. ISBN 978-0-86636-432-4.
  22. ^Bonhams (8 June 2023). Travel & Exploration Sale. Knightsbridge: Bonhams Auction House.
  23. ^ abDennis, Anthony (3 February 1990). "Brush with fame". The Age. p. 230.
  24. ^"Valentino revisited..."The Australian Women's Weekly. Vol. 49, no. 31. Australia, Australia. 20 January 1982. p. 11. Retrieved 27 October 2025 – via National Library of Australia.
  25. ^Cilento, Diane (2006). My nine lives. London: Viking. p. 435. ISBN 978-0-7181-4925-3.
  26. ^Ingram, Terry (Winter 1990). "Art Market". Art and Australia. 27 (4): 608.
  27. ^ abMcDonald, John (20 February 1988). "To please or chasten—it's a matter of belief". The Sydney Morning Herald. p. 75.
  28. ^Bonyhady, Tim (August 1999). "Bludgeon, dirk and grease". Eureka Street. 9 (6): 34–40. doi:10.3316/ielapa.991111985 (inactive 27 October 2025). ISSN 1036-1758.{{cite journal}}: CS1 maint: DOI inactive as of October 2025 (link)
  29. ^Friend, Donald; Britain, Ian (2010). The Donald Friend Diaries: chronicles & confessions of an Australian artist. Melbourne: The Text Publishing Company. p. 427. ISBN 978-1-921656-70-5.
  30. ^Hockey, Patrick (January 1987). "Nindooinbah House: An 1850s Australian homestead is an oasis untouched by time". House and Garden. 159 (1): 150–160.
  31. ^Guest, Sarah; Harpur, Jerry (1990). Private gardens of Australia. Melbourne: Lothian Publ. Co. pp. 27–31. ISBN 978-0-85091-415-3.
  32. ^Harpur, Jerry (2005). Gardens in perspective. London: Mitchell Beazley. pp. 128–9. ISBN 978-1-84000-771-8.
  33. ^Burke, David (December 1996). "Personal Impressions of Pre-Conference Tour". Australian Garden History : Journal of the Australian Garden History Society. 8 (3). Australian Garden History Society: 23.
  34. ^Gilliatt, Mary (1977). Dream houses. London: Conan Enterprises. pp. 32, 35. ISBN 978-1-85029-107-7.
  35. ^Johnson, Judy (18 February 1990). "Some Rooms: Patrick Hockey". The Sydney Morning Herald. p. 172.
  36. ^Dunlop, Primrose (7 June 1981). "'It's a rape of every ethnic culture'". The Sydney Morning Herald. p. 123.
  37. ^"Cremation Register summary: Hockey, Patrick William". deceased online. Retrieved 28 October 2025.
  38. ^Corbally Stourton Contemporary Art (1993). Australian masters, old and new. London: Corbally Stourton Contemporary Art. OCLC 221960172.
  39. ^"Search results for the term: Patrick Hockey | The Scheding Index of Australian Art and Artists | Art Research". www.artresearch.com.au. Retrieved 27 October 2025.
  40. ^ abMcGrath, Sandra (1994). Patrick Hockey, his life and work. Sydney: Beagle Press. ISBN 978-0-947349-09-7.
  41. ^"Mrs Margaret De Burgh Hockey". Prime Minister & Cabinet Australia. Retrieved 28 October 2025.
  42. ^McCulloch, Alan; Nodrum, Charles (1984). Encyclopedia of Australian art. Hawthorn, Vic: Hutchinson Group. p. 971. ISBN 0-09-148300-X.
  43. ^"Prizewinners". Art and Australia. 11 (4): 332. Autumn 1974.
  44. ^"art line". Tharunka. Vol. 22, no. 8. New South Wales, Australia. 21 April 1976. p. 14. Retrieved 27 October 2025 – via National Library of Australia.
  45. ^"Exhibitions: New South Wales". Art and Australia. 13 (3): 222. Summer 1976.
  46. ^"Exhibitions: Queensland". Art and Australia. 15 (2): 134. Summer 1977.
  47. ^"Exhibitions: New South Wales". Art and Australia. 16 (2): 187. Summer 1978.
  48. ^"Exhibitions: New South Wales". Art and Australia. 17 (1): 95. Spring 1979.
  49. ^ ab"Exhibitions, New South Wales". Art and Australia. 18 (1): 87. Spring 1980.
  50. ^Greenhill Galleries (Spring 1986). "Advertisement". Art and Australia. 24 (1): 135.
  51. ^"Exhibitions: Western Australia". Art and Australia. 24 (2): 264. Summer 1986.
  52. ^ ab"Will women go for mango tea?". The Canberra Times. Vol. 64, no. 20, 033. Australian Capital Territory, Australia. 16 February 1990. p. 13. Retrieved 27 October 2025 – via National Library of Australia.
  53. ^Holdsworth Galleries (Autumn 1990). "Patrick Hockey: Major Exhibition (advertisement)". Art and Australia. 27 (3): 467.
  54. ^"Advertising". Art and Australia. 33 (2): 260. Summer 1995.
  55. ^"Holdsworth Galleries to close its doors". The Australian Jewish News. Vol. 102, no. 4. New South Wales, Australia. 11 October 1996. p. 4. Retrieved 27 October 2025 – via National Library of Australia.
  56. ^Kozminsky Galleries, Kozminsky Galleries: Australian Gallery File, retrieved 27 October 2025
  57. ^"Anthea Polson Gallery". The Scheding Index of Australian Art & Artists.
  58. ^Dondas, Moira (1998). Profile Australia's Northern Territory (6th ed.). Darwin: Lifestyle Pub. p. 45. ISBN 978-0-9585700-0-8.
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