THE CAST
ROBERT CLINCH
Artist
Robert Clinch has been a full-time painter and printmaker for over thirty years. He has exhibited extensively throughout Australia, for over ten years in New York, and in Hong Kong. His 2013 mid-career retrospective, Robert Clinch: Fanfare for the common man, (Art Gallery of Ballarat), exhibited as Robert Clinch: Sounds of Silence, (The National Museum in Szczecin, Poland) in 2014. Robert’s current exhibition, Objet D’art, is on a two year tour of Australian Regional Galleries. Amongst a number of national art-prizes, Robert has won the Wynne Trustees Water-Colour Prize (1989 and 1993), a Martin Bequest Travelling Scholarship (1993), and a State Library of Victoria Creative-Fellowship (2012/13). His work has been purchased by National, State, Regional and Corporate collections.
JEFF BROWN
Collector
Classic car collector Jeff Brown, son of renowned art collector Joseph Brown whose art collection is a highlight of the National Gallery of Victoria, collaborated with Robert Clinch to conceive this engaging project.
TOMMY DYSART
Tommy is a Scottish-born Australian stage, television and film actor. Having graduated from NIDA in 1959, Tommy began his career as a vocalist. His high-profile early television roles included appearances in Skippy and Phoenix Five, followed by several roles in the Crawford Productions police drama series Homicide, Division 4, Matlock Police, Cop Shop and as Jock Stewart in Prisoner. Later in the 1990s Tommy had many guest starring roles and appearances including the well renowned role in the iconic Australian television commercial for Yellow pages where he calls a series of mechanics about his problematic‚ Goggomobil. He was also known for playing a recurring character of a Mafia-boss like butcher in advertisements for‚ Don Smallgoods.
JOAN BROCKENSHIRE
Joan began performing at the tender age of 7, appearing in TV shows like “Young Seven” and “Stairway to the Stars”. Joan is one of Australia’s most highly respected musical performers. Joan’s unique talents have seen her in great demand for not only musical theatre but Joan has also played many feature roles in television productions like The Sullivans, Bell Bird, Cop Shop and Prisoner. Joan is married to fellow actor Tommy Dysart and is also well known for her role as Tommy’s wife in the iconic Australian television commercial for Yellow pages where he calls a series of mechanics about his problematic Goggomobil.
BILL BUCKLE (OAM)
Bill Buckle Jr entered the family business in 1947 after his father died. From 1959 to 1961 Buckle Motors produced the original fibreglass-bodies Goggomobil Dart, a two-seater sport car based on the Goggomobil Coupe. Originally doorless with a 293cc engine, later models featured small suicide doors, a hardtop and a 400cc engine. Nowadays the Goggomobil Dart remains as an iconic Australian vehicle.
BILL HEMMING
Bill started an Accountancy Degree when working with the Taxation Office until he realised this was opposite to what he liked! He moved to the BMC car company (later Leyland Australia) in various marketing roles, including launching the infamous P76 family car.
Within the Leyland empire, Bill then spent 6 years in London, Dusseldorf and Brussels before leaving the rapidly failing company in 1980 as European Marketing Manager and returning to Australia to work in Advertising and Promotions. He began dabbling in historic motor racing and after settling in Melbourne with his second wife and 4 daughters, Bill needed to escape his house full of women and bought the Elfin Sports Car company where he could indulge in his passion of building, racing and collecting historic racing and sports cars to complement his collections of watches and Australian art. Now semi retired, Bill runs his marketing company for half the day, and convenes The Elfin Heritage Centre which houses his car collection and allows him to continue playing on race circuits around the world.
LAURAINE DIGGINS (OAM)
1946 - 2019
"We pay tribute to Lauraine and recognise and celebrate her dedication to the arts in Australia, most recently acknowledged by her award of the OAM in the Australia Day Honours, 26 January 2019 for her service to the museums and galleries sector. Lauraine Diggins Fine Art specialises in Australian colonial, impressionist, modern, contemporary and Australian Aboriginal painting, sculpture and decorative arts. Lauraine’s professional involvement in Australian art commenced in 1974. Her support of artists encompassed relationships and exhibitions from those just starting their career to others firmly established in the canons of Australian art history. Lauraine was a generous, inspiring and formidable woman and very much the embodiment of Lauraine Diggins Fine Art". Vale Lauraine Diggins.
DAVID THOMAS
Born Ballarat, Victoria, Australia, 23 September 1937. Educated The University of Melbourne. Keeper of Pictorial Collections, National Library of Australia, 1963-65; Director, Newcastle City Art Gallery, 1965-75; CEO, Australian Gallery Directors Council, 1975-76; Director, Art Gallery of South Australia, 1976-83; Director, Carrick Hill, Adelaide, 1983-87; Director, Bendigo Art Gallery, Victoria, 1987-95; David Thomas Fine Arts, Melbourne, 1996-2010. Curator, director, writer on Australian art and artists, including Rupert Bunny, Landsowne Press, 1970; Andrew Sibley: An Epic of the Everyman, Macmillan,2004; d’ART: The Art of Robert Clinch, 2007; Criss Canning: The Pursuit of Beauty, Macmillan 2007; Walters: Art of realism & Abstraction, Macmillan,2009; The Life and Art of Rupert Bunny: A Catalogue Raisonne, 2 vols, Thames & Hudson, 2017. Numerous essays for leading Australian art auction houses. Exhibitions colonial to contemporary art.
GERARD VAUGHAN
Gerard Vaughan has recently retired as director of the National Gallery of Australia (2014-18), and was previously director of the National Gallery of Victoria (1999-2012), where he was responsible for delivering its 1999-2003 redevelopment program. In addition, he was responsible for a major fundraising campaign for the building and collections, and oversaw a new series of major blockbuster exhibitions, as well as exhibitions on both historic and contemporary Australian art.
His career has been dedicated to both academia and public museology.  He is a graduate in art history of the University of Melbourne, and undertook a doctorate at Oxford University, and has always specialised in the social history of art, and in the history of taste and private and public art collecting. In 1994 he was appointed the inaugural director of the British Museum Development Trust in London, created to support the rebuilding of the BM by the architect Norman Foster. He  returned to Australia in 1999 to become director of the NGV in Melbourne. He has recently returned to research and writing and, among several projects, is writing a history of private art collecting in Australia. He has been appointed by the Northern Territory Government as co-chair of the advisory board for the proposed National Aboriginal Art Gallery in Alice Springs. “
ANNIE BROWN
I was born with a fully developed sense of curiosity which, owing partly to the tolerance of my parents, and partly to the sedentary nature of their life, developed early into an indiscriminate acquisitive need to collect. I had collections of stamps, coins, shells, petrol cards, cereal toys, tram tickets, dolls from foreign lands. By my early teens I had started to collect textiles, cotton reels, buttons, pictures. Â Later I became absorbed with things old: clothing, music instruments, books. A love of travel fuelled a collection of ethnic miscellany. Enjoying these items helped to develop an aesthetic response that continues today. Parallel to the emotional stimulation of the Arts my studies in mathematics aligned me to the Sciences. To this day I still enjoy the tension between my love of the Emotional and my respect for the Rational.
PAUL FAULKNER
Paul Faulkner somehow finds time between a busy family life with his wife Jane and their three sons and a passion for historic motor-sport, to manage his engineering business of twenty-five years.
When described as a ‘car collector’, he, in his own words, says he has ‘simply ended up buying more cars over the years than he has sold’. While actively involved in racing cars, he’s equally happy working on them in his garage. His enjoyment of the challenge of solving engineering problems, extends from the factory to the workshop, in a constant juggling act that he appears to welcome.
Paul enjoys the company of friends and colleagues, particularly with a wine in hand and some good music playing.
MICHAEL SCHOENFELD
Michael Schoenfeld has been a Chartered Accountant for over 40 years. He managed the Schoenfeld's Accounting Practice for over 25 years. Currently he runs a Consulting Practice providing strategic and management advice to a stable of interesting and diverse clients. Michael participates on a number of Boards and Advisory Boards. He considers giving financial advice to his clients as well as helping the most vulnerable people in the community a privilege. He is a long-standing Board Member of Jewish Care (Vic) Inc. Staying physically active at the gym, and playing golf and tennis socially is part of his routine. Travelling to inspiring locations to photograph people and places is another creative outlet. Supporting the Essendon Football club and socialising with those who are crazy bomber supporters is a passion which Michael shares with his wife, Jennie and son, Julius.