Though Gina Rinehart’s patronage of Australian sporting codes goes back well over a decade, her presence at the Paris Olympics was substantially more overt than what we’ve seen in the past. Australia’s richest citizen attended numerous events, took endless photos with athletes and their families, hosted the team on a cruise down the Seine, and detailed how Hancock wagyu beef was especially flown in from Australia for the catering, while athletes have been quick to sing her praises. After winning a bronze in rowing, Annabelle McIntyre declared of her benefactor: “She’s really in it with us.
” Artwork: Dionne Gain Credit: Since the 2012 Olympic Games in London, Rinehart – through her mining company Hancock Prospecting – has ploughed up to $80 million into sports and athletes across swimming, rowing, volleyball and artistic swimming. But with that money, weird strings can be attached. Even writing it down months later, what happened in May was a bizarre sequence of events.
Staff at Hancock contact an Olympic gold medallist . They want him to rally the national swim team to lobby an art gallery to remove a painting that none of them have gone to see. All because among a panel of 21 portraits, someone else didn’t enjoy a likeness.
Kyle Chalmers has a lot of artwork inked across his chest, but he’s not known for giving regular comment on the National Gallery of Australia’s programming choices. Nor were the curators likely to be moved by his intercession, lap ti.