Martin Ritchie Sharp (21 January 1942 – 1 December 2013) was an Australian artist, cartoonist, songwriter and film-maker.

Career

Sharp was born in

Bellevue Hill, New South Wales Bellevue Hill is a harbourside eastern suburb of Sydney, in the state of New South Wales, Australia, located five kilometres east of the Sydney central business district, in the Municipality of Woollahra. The suburb is located within the Divi ...

in 1942, and educated at Cranbrook private school, where one of his teachers was the artist

Justin O'Brien Justin O'Brien (2 August 1917 – 25 January 1996) was an Australian artist. He won the inaugural Blake Prize in 1951. Collections O'Brien's works are held in the collections of the National Gallery of Australia, the Art Gallery of New South ...

. In 1960, Sharp enrolled at the

National Art School The National Art School (NAS) is a tertiary level art school, located in , an inner-city suburb of Sydney, New South Wales, Australia. The school is an independent accredited higher education provider offering specialised study in studio arts p ...

at East Sydney. He was one of the editors of '' Oz'', an Australia/UK

alternative Alternative or alternate may refer to: Arts, entertainment and media * Alternative (''Kamen Rider''), a character in the Japanese TV series ''Kamen Rider Ryuki'' * ''The Alternative'' (film), a 1978 Australian television film * ''The Alternative ...

/ underground satire magazine published from 1963 to 1973 and associated with the international counterculture of that era. Sharp was called Australia's foremost pop artist. He wrote the lyrics of the

Cream Cream is a dairy product composed of the higher-fat layer skimmed from the top of milk before homogenization. In un-homogenized milk, the fat, which is less dense, eventually rises to the top. In the industrial production of cream, this process ...

song "

Tales of Brave Ulysses "Tales of Brave Ulysses" is a song recorded in 1967 by British group Cream. It was released as the B-side to the "Strange Brew" single in June 1967. In November, the song was included on Cream's second album, ''Disraeli Gears''. The song featu ...

," and created the cover art for Cream's ''

Disraeli Gears ''Disraeli Gears'' is the second studio album by the British rock band Cream. It was released in November 1967 and reached No. 5 on the UK Albums Chart. Search "Cream" in ''Name of Artist'', and No. 1 on the Swedish and Finnish charts. The alb ...

'' and ''

Wheels of Fire ''Wheels of Fire'' is the third album by the British rock band Cream. It was released in the US in June 1968 as a two-disc vinyl LP, with one disc recorded in the studio and the other recorded live. It was released in the UK on August 9. It ...

album An album is a collection of audio recordings issued on compact disc (CD), vinyl, audio tape, or another medium such as digital distribution. Albums of recorded sound were developed in the early 20th century as individual 78 rpm records c ...

s. He designed at least two

poster A poster is a large sheet that is placed either on a public space to promote something or on a wall as decoration. Typically, posters include both textual and graphic elements, although a poster may be either wholly graphical or wholly text ...

s for Australia's premier contemporary

circus A circus is a company of performers who put on diverse entertainment shows that may include clowns, acrobats, trained animals, trapeze acts, musicians, dancers, hoopers, tightrope walkers, jugglers, magicians, ventriloquists, and unicyclis ...

Circus Oz Circus Oz is a contemporary circus company based in Australia, collectively owned by its Membership, founded in 1977. Its shows incorporate theatre, satire, rock 'n' roll and a uniquely Australian humour. History Early years Circus Oz was inco ...

, including the 'World-famous'/'Non-Stop Energy' design.

Later interests

For most of the 1970s and beyond, Sharp's work and life was dominated by two major interests: Sydney's

Luna Park Luna Park is a name shared by dozens of currently operating and defunct amusement parks. They are named after, and partly based on, the first Luna Park, which opened in 1903 during the heyday of large Coney Island parks. Luna parks are small-s ...

and the entertainer Tiny Tim.

Luna Park

Sharp's involvement with the restoration of

in the 1970s proved a bittersweet experience. In 1979, as pressure mounted to redevelop the prime harbourside site, a fire in the Luna Park Ghost Train claimed seven lives, including a father and his two sons. The fire was a turning point in Sharp's life; like many others he firmly believed that it was a deliberate act of terrorism aimed at destroying the park and making the site available for redevelopment. In a 2010 interview on the ABC Radio National program ''The Spirit of Things'', he revealed that the fire and the circumstances surrounding it had exerted a profound effect on his spiritual outlook.

Tiny Tim

Sharp first saw performer Tiny Tim at the

Royal Albert Hall The Royal Albert Hall is a concert hall on the northern edge of South Kensington, London. One of the UK's most treasured and distinctive buildings, it is held in trust for the nation and managed by a registered charity which receives no govern ...

in 1968 at the suggestion of

Eric Clapton Eric Patrick Clapton (born 1945) is an English rock and blues guitarist, singer, and songwriter. He is often regarded as one of the most successful and influential guitarists in rock music. Clapton ranked second in ''Rolling Stone''s list o ...

. From that time on, Tiny Tim was one of Sharp's strongest inspirations.

"Tim's appropriation of song is very much like my appropriation of images. We are both collagists taking the elements of different epochs and mixing them to discover new relationships."

"Eternity"

Sharp's work was celebrated in many exhibitions including a special'' Yellow House'' exhibition at the

Art Gallery of NSW The Art Gallery of New South Wales (AGNSW), founded as the New South Wales Academy of Art in 1872 and known as the National Art Gallery of New South Wales between 1883 and 1958, is located in The Domain, Sydney, Australia. It is the most importa ...

and a major retrospective at the

Museum of Sydney The Museum of Sydney is a historical collection and exhibit, built on the ruins of the house of New South Wales' first Governor, Arthur Phillip, on the present-day corner of Phillip and Bridge Street, Sydney. Description The original house, ...

which ran from October 2009 to March 2010.

Sydney Opera House

Sharp maintained a lifelong friendship with artist

Lin Utzon Lin Utzon (born 21 May 1946) is a Danish designer who has created a wide variety of abstract decorative works from textiles to ceramics both in Denmark and abroad. Personal life and education Born on 21 May 1946 in the Frederiksberg district of C ...

, daughter of the Danish architect of the Sydney Opera House

Jørn Utzon Jørn Oberg Utzon, , Hon. FAIA (; 9 April 191829 November 2008) was a Danish architect. He was most notable for designing the Sydney Opera House in Australia, completed in 1973. When it was declared a World Heritage Site on 28 June 2007, Utzon ...

. The architect was controversially forced from his uncompleted masterpiece in 1966 and secretly left Australia with the aid of Sharp's mother. In the mid-1990s, Sharp helped broker a reconciliation between the Sydney Opera House and Jørn Utzon, who subsequently developed a set of design principles to guide the building's future.

Death

Sharp inherited the heritage-listed house ''Wirian'', in Victoria Road, Bellevue Hill, Sydney, in 1978. The house had been bought by Sharp's grandfather, Stuart Douglas Ritchie, a merchant, in 1937 for 20,000 pounds. Sharp lived there until he died from

emphysema Emphysema, or pulmonary emphysema, is a lower respiratory tract disease, characterised by air-filled spaces ( pneumatoses) in the lungs, that can vary in size and may be very large. The spaces are caused by the breakdown of the walls of the alv ...

on 1 December 2013, at the age of 71.