Sandra and Thomas

Tell us about yourself and the art you are interested in.

We are Thomas and Sandra, married for many years and with three grown up children. We live in the wonderful city of Sydney overlooking Bondi Beach, in a beautiful home designed by our friend and architect Angelo Candalepas.

Even before we were married we had a shared interest in design, art and architecture. In many ways, this interest has underpinned many of our decisions related to how we live, the furniture we sit on and even the holidays we have. When we were newly married with not much money, a big life event would often be marked by the purchase of a piece of art.

"We do not buy simply for investment; we buy because we love it."

Thomas is the researcher, an avid reader of art collecting magazines and subscriber to every art gallery or auction house there is! His first loves are painting and photography. Whereas I, Sandra am the emotional buyer and has a greater interest in sculpture and ceramics and is the one that oversees how the collection is displayed in our homes.

We do not buy simply for investment; we buy because we love it, and for us, the value of the piece is in the background. Our collection ranges from big modern abstracts, portraits in oils by painters long past, large photographic prints to Aboriginal art bought at auction. We don’t just buy from galleries, we buy from auctions, direct from the artists and a favourite from the National Art School exhibitions as we love supporting emerging artists. Every piece comes with a story and perhaps this is the joy we derive most. We can recall the decision to buy with each piece and the elation of bringing it home.

We have a lot of works that our children have lived with from birth and they don’t see them as precious but part of the fabric of our life. Even before this new big house, it was a smaller older home that we eventually rebuilt so our children think it’s perfectly normal for a large painting to sit leaning against a wall for years waiting for the right place to be hung.

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Tell us about the artwork you have purchased with Art Money and how you came to discover them.

Art Money came into our lives in 2015 when we discovered a Peter Nowotny sculpture from Conny Dietzschold Gallery in 2015, and again when Thomas discovered photographs by Justine Varga in 2017 from Hugo Michell Gallery. Thomas had been following her career since she graduated from the National Art School then coincidentally met her at her printer, who he used for his hobby photography. We bought from her exhibition for our newly built home in 2017, and have used it since to collect many of her prints. The best part of buying from current exhibiting artist is we often become friends with the artists and invite them to see their works in situ.

A more recent purchase is a mixed media artwork from Dominik Mersch Gallery, Sydney by artist Locust Jones which lives near the main entrance of our home.
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Why do you choose to buy with Art Money?

It’s convenient, it helps if you can’t afford the piece in one payment and this is true whether it’s a few hundred dollars or much more.  And the best reason of course is you get to bring it home straight away!

Photography by Daniel Boud.