Summary

White Christian Dior button-down shirt, still in its original packaging, with the price tag and brand label still attached, owned by Lindsay Motherwell. It was probably purchased for him by his wife Sylvia who worked at Myer. Lindsay was quite a fashionable dresser, and worked in a menswear store briefly.

Sylvia Boyes (a South African-born orphan) and Lindsay Motherwell (a Melbourne-born drummer) met in Cape Town, South Africa in 1967 through their theatre connections. They fell in love but due to apartheid laws were forced to leave South Africa to marry in London. They subsequently relocated permanently to Melbourne in 1970.

Physical Description

White business shirt from the Monsieur range by Christian Dior. It is still folded in its original plastic packaging, with the Myer price tag still attached, inside the packet. The right breast pocket has a flap buttoned down on the top, and the Dior logo is embroidered on the top edge of the left breast pocket. There is also a piece of plastic holding up the collar. It is a size 39 (neck size)

Significance

Statement of Historical Significance:
This collection provides a significant opportunity to represent political and personal freedom as a motivation for migrating to Australia within the international context of both apartheid in South Africa and the end of the White Australia policy in Australia. The personal narrative is well documented and the objects provide a material way to follow the lives of both Lindsay and Sylvia, both separately and where they coincide in South Africa and onwards together to Melbourne. While this is ultimately a love story, it plays out through the collection against the backdrop of apartheid South Africa, sixties London and an increasingly multicultural Australia.

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