WATERHOUSE, PHYL (1917-1989)

"Portrait of Thyra Mae Couzens" (c.1945)
oil on board
46 x 40cm
signed upper right
*gift from the artist
*thence by decent
*private collection, Melbourne
 
Waterhouse was a prominent Australian Modernist. She studied drawing and painting under W. B. McInnes and Charles Wheeler at the National Gallery School. Here she met fellow student, and future husband, artist Charles Bush. Waterhouse had her first one-woman exhibition at Georges Gallery in 1946. She was twice winner of the Crouch Prize and Women's Weekly Prize. Waterhouse is widely represented in most Australian National Galleries and other important private institutions.
 
"Thyra was born Thyra Mae Fairbairn in 1925 in Essendon, Victoria, to Roy and Daphne Fairbairn. She married Cedric Couzens in 1944 in Melbourne, Victoria. They had three boys and the family lived in Moonee Ponds until the late 1950s. This painting was painted by family friend, Phyl Waterhouse, daughter of Stuart Waterhouse and his wife. It would have been painted in the mid to late 1940s. Thyra was a milliner by trade and a very elegant woman. I can recall visiting the Waterhouse family on numerous occasions when Phyl and her friend Charles Bush were present. I can remember Phyl and Charles purchasing a 1920s model Lancier Tourer, which Phyl’s father painted yellow for them. 
Phyl’s father was a steward on the ‘Spirit of Progress’ steam train which travelled between Melbourne and Sydney. I can recall waving to Stuart as the train passed by us at the Moonee Ponds rail crossing."
Terry Couzens 
16 March 2021