See inside Penelope Seidler’s extraordinary art-filled home
How architect and art collector Penelope Seidler adds to her landmark Sydney home.
Penelope Seidler has lived in this home, which she designed and built with her husband and fellow architect, Harry Seidler, since 1967. Everything from that time, from the furniture to the hotplates in the kitchen and the modernist masterpieces by Frank Stella, Josef Albers and Helen Frankenthaler, remains original and unchanged.
“In the great houses of the world, the great cathedrals and churches, art is an integral part of the architecture. And that’s the feeling here, too. Nothing’s going to change,” says Seidler.
This renowned modernist reinforced concrete and stone home, built on a steep block in Killara on Sydney’s North Shore, is undeniably a work of art itself. The large-scale paintings that have anchored its interior for more than six decades reflect not only the Seidlers’ innate appreciation for the interconnectedness of art and architecture, but also the relationships they built over the years with artists such as Frank Stella, Sol LeWitt and Alexander Calder. But it’s the stacks of art books, the small print of Max Dupain’s Sunbaker in the guest bathroom (signed “For Penelope”), the needlepoints and textiles, and the collection of work by leading Indigenous artists, from Emily Kam Kngwarray and Rover Thomas to Danie Mellor and James Tylor, that speak to Seidler’s lifelong love of the arts and her ongoing support for artists.
Seidler studied architecture at the University of Sydney, where her friends and contemporaries included Robert Hughes and Clive James, and Lloyd Rees was a lecturer. “[Rees] was just wonderful and gave memorable lectures about the first time he saw a Raphael or a Velázquez,” she says.
Seidler might have studied fine art instead of architecture if she had the opportunity, but as architects, art was central to both her and Harry’s lives. Harry Seidler was a student of Josef Albers, whose Homage to the Square hangs in the study. “In 1967, there was a big show here from the Museum of Modern Art in New York and a lot of the work was for sale. There were four of [Albers’s] square paintings. The Art Gallery of New South Wales bought one, the National Gallery of Australia bought one, the National Gallery of Victoria bought one and we bought the fourth. We were thrilled.”
As they were with the Helen Frankenthaler they found while travelling. “We saw the work in New York and Harry brought out his tape measure and said, ‘It just fits perfectly’. And we both loved it,” Seidler explains. “That was more or less the same with Sam Francis, who we discovered later was born on the same day as Harry.”
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Harry found the Stella but they had to wait until the children grew out of the downstairs playroom before putting it on the wall. Harry would go on to commission Stella to create an artwork for the lobby of Sydney’s Grosvenor Place, just as he would commission LeWitt for Darlinghurst’s Horizon Building and Australia Square. A small work by LeWitt also hangs in their bedroom – further testament to these relationships.
“There are a few key places in the house where we searched for the right thing, and having found what we thought was right, they’re there, they’re not going to move. They’re part of the architecture and the house,” says Seidler.
The evolving nooks and shelves, though, are all hers. “Since Harry died, I’ve been exploring other realms and having an interesting time. I always appreciated what Harry liked. But his appreciation, in my opinion, was narrower than mine! And although I liked all these major works, and they were definitely dual decisions, the little things, most of them are mine.”
Some are very literally hers. Over the past couple of decades, Seidler has been methodically and lovingly recreating each of Harry’s architectural projects in cross-stitch. It’s a habit that caught the eye of her friend, Kamilaroi artist Jonathan Jones, whose work she started collecting more than a decade ago. “He rang me up and said, ‘I know you like stitching. I’ve got this project’. I was thrilled to be part of his 2021–22 show untitled (transcriptions of country) at Palais de Tokyo [in Paris].”
Jones is one of dozens of artists who have visited the home. Others include Christo and Jeanne-Claude, and William Kentridge, whose work hangs downstairs. Seidler is also a regular and generous host for architectural tours. “I love people experiencing it, but I think people respond to it better now. I enjoy it when people respond positively because I feel they understand, but if people don’t like it, I mean, so what?”
That the house and art collection endures brings great comfort and pride to Seidler. “I love these works – it’s all a part of me. It would be shocking to think of them not being here. It’s shocking to think of me not being here in the house. I’ve got an apartment in the city, which I enjoy going to, but when I come back here, I know I’m home. It’s fabulous.”
Collecting: Living with Art by Kym Elphinstone (Thames & Hudson) is out in April.
This story is from the March issue of WISH.
