Vale: Betty Churcher

Arts administrator Betty Churcher, best known for presenting ABC arts programmes Betty Churcher’s Take 5 and Hidden Treasures, has died aged 84.

She died on Monday night, from cancer.

Churcher was one of the most adored figures in the Australian art community and a formidable and talented arts administrator. She was appointed director of the National Gallery of Australia (NGA) in 1990, a position she held until 1997. She was the first and so far only female director of the NGA. Before that, she was director of the Art Gallery of Western Australia.

She hosted several television shows in the 1990s and written several books, including The Art of War about war artists.

Current NGA director Gerald Vaughan has described Ms Churcher as one of Australia’s great artistic educators.

Dr Vaughn said she not only brought masterpieces to Australian shores, but she was able to explain how important they were to the Australian public.

“She was a person who loved art. She loved talking about art, she was an artist, her husband Roy, who died last year was an artist, one of her four sons, Peter Churcher, is a very distinguished contemporary Australian artist,” he told ABC.

“I have seen her not only on television but in a gallery situation communicating with the public about a picture.”