Anh Doh paints Kurt Fearnley

Kurt Fearnley levers his body out of his wheelchair and hoists himself into a yellow armchair in Anh Doh’s studio. He tucks his lifeless legs under him and grins widely at Anh who is about to paint his portrait for the ABC series ‘Anh’s Brush with Fame’.

Kurt was born with a congenital disorder called sacral agenesis. He has never had the use of his legs but as the youngest of five children, getting out of his chair and climbing trees was natural.

Anh says of him: “Kurt was born with disability but for me he has more ability than anyone I’ve every met.”

He was born in the small town of Carcoar in New South Wales. Everyone was family or friend and everyone supported him. The primary school principal refused to let him go to a special school and his teacher, Mrs Dickson, encouraged him to compete.

She put his peers and family in wheelchairs so they could see how it was for Kurt. All 20 of them competed with him on a level playing field.

His family loved sport and Kurt was determined to be one of them, even crawling in events that most would think impossible.

When he went to high school (300 students) he moved into a new community that hadn’t known him all his life and it was tough. The other kids’ curiosity was often terrifying after he’d come to expect love and acceptance from his little community of Carcour.

He says: “Disability is a harsh reality for a lot of people but a little bit of community can change that.”

When he was 14 the 200 people in his town raised $10,000 to send him to the US. They bought him a racing wheelchair and a ticket to Fort Collins, Colorado, where he felt normal among the 500 other wheelchair users competing in a track meet––all of them completely fine with their disability. That’s when he gained a huge amount of self-confidence—to compete and also to socialize with strangers and get a girlfriend.

The town invested in him and allowed him to feel that he could do anything and become the man he is today. Kurt’s attitude to life is strong. He says:

“Disability isn’t ugly. It isn’t fragile. It’s a natural part of the human experience.” And he considers himself the luckiest guy in the world.

As a wheelchair racer (long- and middle-distance) he has an amazing record of competition wins including five Paralympics and three gold medals. He crawled the Kokoda Track as a fundraiser for beyondblue and Movember and, in 2004, received a Medal of the Order of Australia (OAM). He is married and has one son, who has no disability.When Anh finished the portrait, Kurt was impressed with his own good looks! (He has a great sense of humour). It conveyed a gentle wisdom combined with strength. Kurt loved the painting and likened his reaction to his races, saying:

“The perfect race wasn’t the result but how I felt during it.”

Anh considered it one of his best works because he enjoyed the process very much, “And that’s a gold medal for me.”

Introduce children to the concept of wheelchair use through chapter book ‘In My World’ with the story of Bec. See Book Sales page.