Well, in 2007
I am a 52
year old 6 ft 4 inch bearded male.
I have been
making stuff for years, ever since I did a course at Melbourne State College
in Arts and Craft ( B.Ed).
It was a great course and we did subjects
such as painting, drawing, woodcraft, sculpture, printmaking, metal craft, textiles, design, art history , psychology and many more
.
Before that I used to make and draw things
but with much less focus.
I was an only child of Lyla and Eddie
Collins born in September 1954 and I went to:
West Preston State School,
Preston Tech( an all boys school in those
days),
Preston Institute of Technology( 3 girls)
and RMIT( Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology)( Lots of girls) .
I didn’t know what I wanted to do as a kid
and followed through with my friends doing the science stream leading
to starting a civil engineering degree. I got chicken pox at the end of year
exams and scraped a pass in most subjects.
I thought I could do better and repeated
the year at RMIT and also did an architecture course in the evening.
This introduced me to life drawing (
where do I look!!) and art history. I had a friend doing the Art and Craft teachers course at Melbourne
State College and this sounded great, especially when they were offering studentships.
At RMIT I met my future wife Marian,(a
radiographer) and we ended up living together in her rented house in
North Melbourne( Molesworth St).
She worked at the Children’s Hospital and I
worked part time as a paper boy and gardener. We married in
1976.
When I finished my course I was posted to
Mortlake ( Western Victoria) and we spent about 8 years there.
Marian worked at
Warrnambool BaseHospital and I worked at Mortlake High School. I started
making small boxes, natural edged mirrors and Red-Gum pedestals.
I sold stuff to Ishka, Rosies, Donvale
Craft Cottage. We had three children, Kathleen, Emily and Caleb and lived on a 20 acre hobby farm
at the foot of Mt Shadwell.
We then moved to Warragul
and I taught at Drouin
Secondary college( and still am!)
Marian works at West Gippsland
Hospital and I did a welding course at Warragul Tafe and decided to use
these new skills to make other arty
crafty items.( Thanks Phil and Greg). We did most of the initial work in
my garage in Albert Rd(
sorry neighbors) and then moved to a 2 acre place at Jindivick where I have
built a shed( studio) which I
periodically add to then clutter up. I am the messiest person in the area
but have been known to be friendly to furry animals and small children.
Since then I have sold work at Town
and Country Gallery in Yarragon, Ishka ( 10 stores in Melbourne) Outhouse,
Fitzworks, Mirboo North Art show and Drouin and Warragul art
shows.\
I teach Design and Technology as well
as Metalwork, Pedal and Power, Art, Woodwork and anything else
they throw at me. I have
helped teams in Tournament of the Minds and I reckon that’s about enough.
