When Maths and Arts are the Perfect Combination

Frank Murri looks at his wife Rieteka when asked about the artist who has influenced him the most. “She’s my muse,” Frank says.

Frank’s background was commerce and law, whereas Rieteka is a Visual Arts graduate from Deakin University. Little did Frank know that a few years after meeting his future wife, he would be preparing a solo exhibition of his sculptures at Maitland Regional Art Gallery.

“I wouldn’t be doing what I’m doing now if it wasn’t for Rieteka,” Frank says. He used to write prose and poetry, but his love for visual arts was stimulated through their relationship. “The fact that we were going to so many exhibitions and openings exposed me to a lot of art. Also, going through Rieteka’s art library fed my imagination.”

Their home in Hamilton South is full of art from local artists, together with their own works: one of Rieteka’s paper sculptures, a tall, green plant, rests inside a perspex box in a corner of their living room; a wooden relief sculptural work by Frank hangs above the staircase.

Rieteka was living in Warrnambool, Victoria, when she heard repeated accounts of how wonderful Newcastle was for artists and she decided to move here. “People in Newcastle are very supportive of one another. They talk among themselves and recommend you. Newcastle is big enough that it can support different creative people but not so big that it becomes impersonal,” she says.

Read more in Edition 81 of Hunter & Coastal Lifestyle Magazine.

Story Elena Terol Sabina. Photo: ‘The Noisy Tree’ by Rieteka Geursen.