Rolf Harris biography
Rolf Harris, CBE, AM (born 30 March 1930) is an Australian musician, singer-songwriter, composer, painter and television personality.
Born in Perth, Western Australia, Harris was a champion swimmer before studying art. He moved to England in 1952, where he started to appear on television programmes on which he drew the characters. He also began a musical career initially with the piano accordion. He wrote the famous song "Tie Me Kangaroo Down, Sport", and when performing in Canada he introduced his popular routine around his song "Jake the Peg". He often uses unusual instruments in his performances: he plays the didgeridoo, has been credited with the invention of the wobble board, a rhythmic percussion instrument, and was associated with the Stylophone, a small electronic keyboard instrument.
From the 1960s he has become a popular television personality, presenting shows including Rolf's Cartoon Club, Animal Hospital and various programmes about serious art. In late 2005 he painted an official portrait of Queen Elizabeth II, which was the subject of a special episode of Rolf on Art.
Early life
Harris was born on 30 March 1930 in Bassendean, a suburb of Perth, Western Australia, to Cromwell ("Crom") Harris and Agnes Margaret Harris (née Robbins) who had both emigrated from Cardiff, Wales. He was named after Rolf Boldrewood, an Australian writer his mother admired. He is the nephew of Australian artist Pixie O'Harris (1903-1991). As a child he owned a dog called Buster Fleabags: he wrote a book of that name for Quick Reads in 2010.
As an adolescent and young adult Harris was a champion swimmer. In 1946 he was the Australian Junior 110 yards Backstroke Champion.
He was also the Western Australian state champion over a variety of distances and strokes during the period from 1948 to 1952.
Harris attended Perth Modern School in Subiaco, and the University of Western Australia.
Whilst just 16, and still a student at Perth Modern School, his self-portrait in oils was one of the 80 works (out of 200 submitted) accepted to be hung in the Art Gallery of New South Wales as an entry in the 1947 Archibald Prize.
He met his wife, the Welsh sculptress and jeweller Alwen Hughes, while they were both art students, and they married on 1 March 1958. They have one daughter, Bindi Harris (born 10 March 1964), who studied art at Bristol Polytechnic and is now a painter.
Harris moved to England as an art student at City and Guilds Art School, Kennington, South London at the age of 22, getting into television with the BBC in 1953, performing a regular ten-minute cartoon drawing section with a puppet called "Fuzz", made and operated on the show by magician Robert Harbin. He illustrated Robert Harbin's Paper Magic (1956). He also had a few acting roles in British television programmes and films as Harry in The Vise and as Pte Proudfoot in the 1955 Tommy Trinder film You Lucky People.
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