Ilsa Konrads, c. 1976 (printed 2002)

Ilsa Konrads (b. 1944), swimmer and editor, came to Australia with her family from Latvia when she was five. She and her brother Jon began swimming at Bankstown Pool, and were tagged 'the Konrads kids' as they developed into champions. Ilsa broke twelve individual world records and six team world records; she won a Commonwealth gold medal in 1958 and a silver in 1962, and an Olympic silver medal for the 4x100m relay in 1960. After a cadetship on the Daily Mirror she began work at Pix magazine. She met Lewis Morley when she was working as chief sub-editor on POL, Dolly and Belle. She edited Belle from 1975 to 1979, when she began five years as editor of Vogue Living. After a move to the Sydney Morning Herald she returned to Vogue Living from 1989 to 1999. Recalling the stormy climate of Australian publishing in the 1970s and 1980s, she comments that she changed employers five times without changing desks.

Collection: National Portrait Gallery
Gift of the artist 2002
Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program