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Fleischmann was already 81 when he completed the commission for the Silver Jubilee celebrations at
St Katharine's Dock, London.
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During the last part of his career, Fleischmann concentrated mainly on portrait commissions.
In 1979 he was commissioned by the English College in Rome to sculpt a portrait of Pope John Paul II
to celebrate the 500th anniversary of the College.Fleischmann made many journeys to the Vatican for
private sittings with the Pope and sat in on other audiences making sketches.
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Pope John Paul II unveiling the finished bust
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The Pope himself visited
the English College on their anniversary and personally unveiled the finished bust in a ceremony to mark
the occasion.
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St Michael
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During 1983 he sculpted a bronze bust of the conductor Sir Charles Mackerras.
As well as these two notable commissions, he also made portraits of the Prima Ballerina
Doreen Wells, and the actor Barry Humphries and kept experimenting with Perspex. One of his
favourite pieces was St Michael, constructed like a three-dimensional collage from the chips
collected from earlier carvings.
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In the winter of 1980-81 Fleischmann held a one-man exhibition entitled "Half a Century of Experiment"
at New South Wales House in London. The exhibition was unveiled by HRH The Princess Michael of Kent.
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His last one-man exhibition was at the David Jones gallery in Sydney in 1988.
Fleischmann had made a habit of spending a short holiday each winter in Tenerife with his
family. They stayed regularly at the Hotel Gran Tinerfe in Playa Las Americas.
After finishing work in January 1990 on "Tribute to the Discovery of DNA", a Water Sculpture
commissioned for the State Library of New South Wales, he left for Tenerife. After a short
illness he passed away there in the company of his family.
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Arthur Fleischmann 1896 - 1990
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