{"id":68658,"date":"2017-06-15T09:36:00","date_gmt":"2017-06-14T23:36:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.wesleymission.org.au\/?post_type=news-and-publication&p=68658"},"modified":"2022-04-20T09:40:11","modified_gmt":"2022-04-19T23:40:11","slug":"phils-story-age-is-no-limit-to-passion","status":"publish","type":"news-and-publication","link":"https:\/\/www.wesleymission.org.au\/news-and-publications\/stories-of-hope\/phils-story-age-is-no-limit-to-passion\/","title":{"rendered":"Phil\u2019s story: Age is no limit to passion"},"content":{"rendered":"\t\t
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At 87 years of age, Wesley Taylor Village resident, Phil Mulray, ticked a major goal off his bucket list when he entered the 2016 Archibald Prize for art with his painting of former Prime Minister Tony Abbott.<\/p>

See how the portrait turned out in part 2 below.<\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t

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Phil sits tall in the sunny corner room that Wesley Taylor Village staff have converted into his personal art studio; surrounded by old peach tins filled with paint brushes, bottles of linseed oil, scuffed boxes of well-twisted tubes of oil paints. Phil is full of laughter, full of smiles, and full of stories from a life spent pursuing his passions and never saying no to a challenge.<\/p>

For the past two years, Olivier Valente, Centre Manager of Wesley Taylor Narrabeen has been running an art exhibition with local schools and aged care facilities. In 2015, Phil produced a beautiful artwork for the exhibition and Olivier was discussing it with another staff member when inspiration struck.<\/p>

\u201cWe thought, why don\u2019t we try to get him to do something special, something spectacular, something out of his scope and see where it takes him,\u201d Olivier said. “”The idea came that we could invite him to produce an artwork to enter the Archibald Prize.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>

With tongue firmly in cheek, Phil recalls, \u201cSo they baled me up in my unit with my wife one day and they said, \u2018You\u2019ve got to do a portrait\u2019. At first, Phil was a little daunted by the idea but discussing the details with Richard and Olivier, he began to see just how possible it was.<\/p>

\u201cWe discussed who we might approach and we thought, a local VIP on the North Shore.<\/p>

\u201cAnd Tony Abbott said yes.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>

Phil had always been a keen painter, but landscapes were his focus. So with Olivier and Richard\u2019s help, Phil tracked down a portrait artist in Narrabeen and began attending weekend classes. Before he knew it, it was time for the first sitting at Tony Abbott\u2019s home, in mid-January, in sweltering heat.<\/p>

\u201cSadly my charcoal drawing, under the stress and the heat and the age and despite my earlier efforts, made him look like a Neanderthal man!<\/p>

\u201cAnd I think he was somewhat taken aback. I was worse than that. I was aghast, and knew we had a long way to go.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t

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Phil\u2019s final portrait of Mr Abbott was a result of eight month\u2019s work and several sittings with the former PM: a few at Mr Abbott\u2019s home and one in the make-shift studio at Wesley Taylor Village. Phil said his renewed passion for painting has given him a fresh outlook on life.<\/p>

\u201cIt\u2019s another dimension on life,\u201d he said. \u201cIt was exciting, exhausting and stressful. My wife thought it was a great stimulus to see me motivated and activated.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>

The final product was unveiled in Mr Abbott\u2019s electorate office before it was transported to the Art Gallery of NSW for judging.<\/p>

\u201cThe climax was to see Tony Abbott\u2019s response,\u201d Phil said. \u201cHe looked at the painting for a minute to a minute and a half. He turned to me and said: \u2018Phil you have done very well\u2019. It was a genuine personal, sincere comment. I was thrilled. It was a great moment and a great feeling.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/section>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

At 87 years of age, Wesley Taylor Village resident, Phil Mulray, ticked a major goal off his bucket list when …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"featured_media":68659,"parent":29713,"menu_order":0,"template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_links_to":"","_links_to_target":"","advanced-sidebar-menu\/link-title":"","advanced-sidebar-menu\/exclude-page":true},"ceo-newsletter":[],"move-to-top-of-sidebar":[],"custom-layouts":[680],"exclude-from-nav":[632],"news-and-publications-tags":[629],"acf":[],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2024-05-09 02:40:42","action":"change-status","newStatus":"private","terms":[],"taxonomy":"custom-layouts"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wesleymission.org.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news-and-publication\/68658"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wesleymission.org.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news-and-publication"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wesleymission.org.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/news-and-publication"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.wesleymission.org.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news-and-publication\/68658\/revisions"}],"up":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wesleymission.org.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news-and-publication\/29713"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wesleymission.org.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/68659"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wesleymission.org.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=68658"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"ceo-newsletter","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wesleymission.org.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/ceo-newsletter?post=68658"},{"taxonomy":"move-to-top-of-sidebar","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wesleymission.org.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/move-to-top-of-sidebar?post=68658"},{"taxonomy":"custom-layouts","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wesleymission.org.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/custom-layouts?post=68658"},{"taxonomy":"exclude-from-nav","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wesleymission.org.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/exclude-from-nav?post=68658"},{"taxonomy":"news-and-publications-tags","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wesleymission.org.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news-and-publications-tags?post=68658"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}