Evert Ploeg painted this portrait of John Schaeffer AO (1941–2020) for the 2014 Archibald Prize. A businessman and philanthropist, Schaeffer built a small cleaning business into an enterprise employing more than 20,000 staff, while also becoming a major art collector and benefactor. Ploeg said that he felt an affiliation with his sitter through their shared Dutch heritage and love of figurative art. He chose Schaeffer's home as the setting for the work, so that he could show him 'immersed in his art'. While the reclining bronze nude in foreground is a work by the American sculptor Cyrus Dallin, other artworks included in the portrait confirm Schaeffer's famously great taste for nineteenth-century British art, especially the work of the Pre-Raphaelites: over his left shoulder is a portrait of artist Frederic Leighton by his devoted friend, George Frederic Watts; beneath that work is a small bust by Thomas Brock, the English sculptor who created Leighton's tomb. In the distant background is a drawing of Joan of Arc by Henry Wallis.
Purchased with funds provided by Harold Mitchell AC
© Evert Ploeg/Copyright Agency, 2022
The National Portrait Gallery respects the artistic and intellectual property rights of others. Works of art from the collection are reproduced as per the
Australian Copyright Act 1968 (Cth). The use of images of works from the collection may be restricted under the Act. Requests for a reproduction of a work of art can be made through a
Reproduction request. For further information please contact
NPG Copyright.
