Sydney artist Anthony Lister speaks out after rape case acquittal
International street artist Anthony Lister, who is now working out of a tiny room-turned art studio in Darlinghurst, says “the weight has lifted somewhat” but he remains “in limbo” despite his acquittal.
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Prominent Sydney artist Anthony Lister has broken his silence after being revealed as the man acquitted of raping two women and indecently assaulting a third.
A jury was unable to reach a verdict on whether Lister raped two other women. The sexual assault allegations will be heard in a retrial in October next year.
Lister, who is now working out of a tiny room-turned art studio a friend has made available in Darlinghurst, told the Sunday Telegraph “the weight has lifted somewhat” but he remains “in limbo”.
Lister was “dropped immediately” by galleries around the world when he was arrested and charged with five counts of having sexual intercourse without consent in 2020.
The alleged offences are purported to have occurred between 2014 and 2017 on separate occasions, police claimed.
The dramatic fall from grace for the artist - a pioneer of Australia’s street art movement and one of the country’s most collected artists - was kept largely under wraps due to a suppression order.
That order was originally made by a magistrate in 2020 on safety grounds after Mr Lister received death threats.
Mr Lister’s lawyers argue the “status quo” should be maintained ahead of the retrial.
But Judge John Pickering questioned whether Mr Lister was really “that well known” and why the order should remain considering “there are so many high-profile cases that don’t get suppression orders”.
At the time of his arrest Lister was “immediately dropped” by galleries in Paris, Milan, New York, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Hong Kong, Japan and “Australia times every city”.
He now works out of a tiny space, and describes his life as “studio hopping and couch surfing”.
“It’s an anomaly to be successful in an industry that you love,” he said. “So I am getting through this by just trying to be optimistic about having a future again.”
Lister spent much of the six-week trial sketching drawings of what he observed.
His defence team argued that the sexual intercourse he had with four of the women, who allege he raped them, was consensual and that no sexual contact “whatsoever” had occurred with another.
The lawyers argued that the complainants “admired” Lister and “even idolised him” and in one case was “obsessed” with the accused.
Defence counsel David Scully SC submitted that in one case a video watched by the jury showed the testimony of one of the women was “complete and utter deluded lies”.
The jury also heard evidence that a “lock” on the door as described by one of the complainants did not exist at the time the alleged offence occurred.
In his closing argument he reminded jurors: “This is not a court of morals. This is not a court of public opinion. This is not an Instagram court. This is not the Surry Hills rumour or gossip court”.
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