We had gone out to celebrate the arrival of our 1,500th visitor to The Art Life in style at The Pier Restaurant in Rushcutters Bay. Our meal was a delightful but demanding repast of fish related dishes, fine wines and staggeringly rich deserts. There are some particularly awful Kerry Lester paintings on the walls, but otherwise we cannot fault the place.
As we were tucking into our main courses who should totter down the restaurant on his way but the semi-legendary senior artist figure of one John Olsen. Dressed in a black suit, with matching beret and a propped up by a fine silver-topped walking stick, Olsen bade farewell to the minions at the restaurant with rude good health and voluminous gusto. Accompanied by his own minders – all men, all in suits – we also spied that Olsen was carrying a slim volume of poetry – or perhaps a play by Tom Stoppard. Good show, old man!
