June Mendoza AO OBE (1924–2024) was born into a musical family in Melbourne and started sketching portraits while touring with her mother, a composer and pianist. Having decided at age 12 to be a painter, by 14 she’d enrolled in life drawing classes and by 17 was working as a commercial artist, cartoonist and illustrator. After the Second World War she moved to London and studied at Central St Martin’s School of Art. A long-time member of the Royal Society of Portrait Painters and the Royal Institute of Oil Painters, Mendoza’s brand of painterly realism appealed to high-profile sitters seeking an accurate likeness combined with naturalness of pose or setting. ‘I like a picture to have a feeling of energy – not just an alert face but some alertness in the body language as well,’ Mendoza said. Among her numerous sitters were Queen Elizabeth II (who sat for Mendoza five times), the Queen Mother, Princess Anne, Princess Diana, King Charles III when Prince of Wales, and Earl Mountbatten, as well as British prime ministers Margaret Thatcher and John Major and the entire House of Commons as it was in 1986. An actor before her portrait painting career took over, Mendoza’s connections to the performing arts world led to portraits of Judi Dench, Penelope Keith and Royal Ballet founder Ninette de Valois among many others, along with those of distinguished musicians such as Jacqueline du Pré and Yehudi Menuhin. Her internationally renowned Australian sitters included soprano Joan Sutherland and her husband, conductor Richard Bonynge. In 1971, Mendoza was commissioned to create the official portrait of then Australian prime minister John Gorton; and in 1988 she painted a group portrait commemorating the first sitting of the House of Representatives in the new Parliament House. Examples of Mendoza’s work are held in many collections in the United Kingdom, including that of the National Portrait Gallery, London. She was named an Officer of the Order of Australia in 1989 for her services to the arts.
