Graham Thorley (1921–1990) entered the Archibald Prize 23 times between 1940 and 1976, and in 1980 was one of the first Australian artists to visit Antarctica, where he painted a series of landscapes. Born in Melbourne, Thorley painted from the age of nine. As a teenager, he won the Herald Art Prize and gained a scholarship to the National Gallery School, where his teachers included WB McInnes. In the 1950s and 1960s he had a studio in Olinda in the Dandenongs; in 1965, declaring that he would not paint any more, he took up a cattle station (Donngan) in the Kimberley region of Western Australia. Having survived cancer, in 1970 he moved back to Victoria, to Balranald, where he ran cattle and horses and began painting again, converting the town's old Masonic Hall into a studio. In 1980 he moved with his horses to Trentham, where he bought a Catholic school, relocated it and turned it into two studios, one for teaching and one for his own use.
