Hegarty ferry

As well as being known as a painter, printmaker and one of Australia’s most natural and expressive draughtsmen, Peter Kingston was also a passionate and principled advocate for heritage causes as diverse as the wooden wharves and ferries of Sydney Harbour, aged relics of Luna Park and endangered dugong habitats in far north Queensland.

When Kingston moved to a house on the shore of Sydney’s Lavender Bay in 1974, it ignited for him an ongoing love for the harbour’s working history and natural beauty that was to become both a central theme in his work and cause for vocal campaigning over decades. This combination of art and advocacy is well encapsulated in this drawing which depicts the ‘Emerald Star’, one of three small wooden ferries operated by Hegarty’s, a boating company that operated runs between Circular Quay and smaller wharves on the lower north shore, including Luna Park, between 1908 and 2003.

Built by Ned Hegarty in 1945 using the hull of a partly built 17-meter fishing trawler and completed at his boatyard in Drummoyne, the Emerald Star was listed with the National Trust of Australia in May 2002 and included in its Register (ref: Australian National Maritime Museum). By the time of Hegarty’s closure their small wooden ferries were no longer financially viable and despite vocal campaigning for their preservation, ceased their familiar routes. Kingston’s regard for the integrity of these humble vessels and their nostalgic recollection of Sydney’s past is evoked in this sensitively rendered drawing of the moored ferry, motionless in the still harbour waters.