Media Clipping – Bob Hart
MELBOURNE engraver Perry Fletcher spent six years creating his masterpiece. And now he would like to find It a home to be on Permanent display. Perry, 51, began his rendition Leonardo Da Vinci’s The Last Supper when he was 24 – painstakingly etching It Into a sheet of brass with a dentist’s drill.
He has added bits along the way, like the 370 cherubs and other cheery figures adorning the border of the 153cm x 61cm piece. The etching contains 30,000 dots, took 3000 hours to complete and accounted for more drill b!ls than five dentists would use in a lifetime.
“I defy anyone to copy what I’ve done,” Perry said yesterday “They’d go
mad ‘ Quite so. Perry’s masterpiece hun!( In Parliament House for
three years In the early 1980s, and In St Vincents Hospital in 1994, where it
was Insured for $500,000 But now Perry wants to find it a home and get it out on display again. “I’d like people to appreciate It,” be said. “I’ve lived with it for long enough.””
Perry Was apprenticed to a city engraver at 16, conscripted at 20, and sent to Vietnam. “When I came back I knew I wanted to engrave a masterpiece of some sort,” Perry said. “So I chose The Last Supper. It’s Immortal – an engraver’s dream.”
Perry runs an engraving business In Prahran and each year engraves the names of winners on Australian Open tennis trophies But such things pale beside his Last supper “It’s priceless.” he said. “How can you put. a value on six years or your life?”
Who knows? Because had he remained In the army, he may may have risen to the
Rank of. er, drill sergeant. – Bob Hart