22 Facts About Ivor Hele

Sir Ivor Henry Thomas Hele, CBE was an Australian artist noted for portraiture.

Ivor Hele was Australia's longest serving war artist and completed more commissioned works than anyone else in the history of Australian art.

Ivor Hele attended Westbourne Park Primary School for a short time, then Prince Alfred College, where at age eight he began art classes under James Ashton, the drawing master.

Ivor Hele initially studied art under James Ashton at PAC and then later at Ashton's Academy of Arts.

Ivor Hele was awarded three first class certificates at the Royal Drawing Society's Art Exhibition in 1924, and Princess Louise's Prize at their exhibition the following year.

Ivor Hele studied at SASAC between 1924 and 1928 and he shared the John Christie Wright Memorial Prize in 1928.

Ivor Hele studied drawing and painting for six months at the academy run by Louis-Francois Biloul in Paris, and another six months at the summer school run by Moritz Heymann at Reichersbeuern, Bad Tolz-Wolfratshausen in the Bavaria Alps.

Ivor Hele was to return to Paris and Bavaria three years later, as a married man.

From July 1932 until January 1933 they honeymooned in Europe visiting Munich and Paris where Ivor Hele studied under his former masters Biloul and Heymann.

In October 1938 Ivor Hele purchased and renovated the property using prize money from two art competitions.

Ivor Hele was appointed an official war artist on 11 October 1941 with the rank of captain.

Treloar, impatient with Ivor Hele's progress called on Louis McCubbin, director of the Art Gallery of South Australia, to investigate; McCubbin expressed his satisfaction and Treloar was mollified.

Ivor Hele remained with the 9th Division, which was later transferred to New Guinea.

Apart from the figure studies and war scenes held by the Australian War Memorial for which he is best known, and the many portraits, Ivor Hele painted many landscapes, particularly of the rugged South Australian coast, and a great number of erotic drawings.

Ivor Hele's work was occasionally seen at The Advertiser's open-air art exhibitions, and very few one-man shows: in 1943,1945,1954 and finally 1970 at the John Martin's auditorium during the Festival of Arts.

Ivor Hele taught life drawing to many well-known Australian artists including Jacqueline Hick, Jeffrey Smart, David Dallwitz, Marjorie Hann, Hugo Shaw, and Geoff Wilson.

Ivor Hele had an older brother, Harold Arthur Ivor Hele, and twin sisters, Beryl, who married Alf Head on 4 October 1930, and Phyllis, who married Jack Dew Laurenti on 3 March 1937.

On 24 March 1932, Ivor Hele married Millicent Mary Jean Berry, a school teacher, at the Manse, Germein Street, Semaphore, South Australia.

Ivor Hele was severely self-critical and only ever held two exhibitions of his work, in 1931 and 1958.

Ivor Hele was a perfectionist who often burned paintings he was dissatisfied with.

Ivor Hele died in the South Australian suburb of Bedford Park and was cremated.

Ivor Hele won Australia's most prestigious portrait prize, the Archibald Prize five times, for these works in the following years:.