Hugh Paterson

  • Artist (Painter)
Hugh Paterson advised Prime Minister Andrew Fisher to tax foreign paintings unless intended for public galleries, thus encouraging the first Australian art boom. Paterson also founded the Commonwealth Art Advisory Board, ancestor of the Australia Council.

Painter and art administrator, father of Betty and Esther Paterson , lived in Melbourne. His neighbour was Frederick McCubbin . Part of a bohemian elite of artistic and theatrical celebrities, Hugh Paterson advised Prime Minister Andrew Fisher ('a couple of Scots’, Esther Paterson described them in 1971) to tax foreign paintings unless intended for public galleries, thus encouraging the first Australian art boom. Hugh Paterson also founded the Commonwealth Art Advisory Board, ancestor of the Australia Council.

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Writers:
Staff Writer
Date written:
1999
Last updated:
2011