A bearded Kevin Rudd and Louie the cat have been immortalised in his official portrait to mark his time as prime minister.
Mr Rudd took a break from his duties as ambassador to the US to attend the official unveiling at Parliament House on Thursday, virtually 10 years after a then clear shaven Mr Rudd left workplace.
The portrait by Australia-born painter Ralph Heimans reveals Mr Rudd at work at his kitchen desk.
Louie the cat was additionally captured after he usually crashed Mr Rudd’s portrait sittings. He’s pictured curiously padding round a leftover sport of chess as the previous prime minister watches on.
Mr Rudd’s household pets, cat Jasper and canine Abby, rose to fame when the Rudds moved into The Lodge in 2017.
The former prime minister went on to publish a youngsters’s ebook with Rhys Muldoon, Jasper and Abby and the Great Australia Day Kerfuffle, about his beloved animals.
In 2016, a video of Mr Rudd chatting to his black cat Mei Mei, which he adopted from a New York shelter, went viral.
All former prime ministers’ portraits are hung within the Parliament House’s Historic Memorials Collection.
It is the primary time a household pet has been captured as a part of the gathering.
Mr Rudd’s spouse Therese Rein and household attended the ceremony alongside Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, US ambassador to Australia Caroline Kennedy and Labor MPs.
In a speech marking the portrait’s first official viewing, Mr Rudd thanked his long-time ally and buddy Mr Albanese for being a “key member” of his authorities.
Mr Rudd mentioned that whereas he needed to cope with the worldwide monetary disaster and the rising menace of local weather change, he thought Mr Albanese had a “much harder job”.
“When I look at what this government now has to wrestle with in this parliament against the huge structural challenges which we face, Prime Minister, you have the harder job than I did,” he mentioned.
Mr Rudd famous the chance of battle was an actual menace, not a idea, the rise of AI and the accelerating local weather disaster had been all main challenges this authorities must cope with.
Mr Rudd, who delivered the National Apology to the Stolen Generation, drew a parallel between the concern campaigns raised then and the Voice to parliament
He requested Australians to think about whether or not the concern campaigns raised forward of the referendum had been justified.
“When they said the apology would be a problem for the nation, it would unleash this torrent of litigation from Indigenous communities across the country, that it would, in fact, send the centre process of reconciliation backwards, not forwards, we proved them wrong,” Mr Rudd mentioned.
Mr Albanese mentioned the National Apology was one of many “finest moments” in parliament since Federation.
“That apology was spoken about for a long period of time,” he mentioned.
“It was said that it will result in division, that it would result in reparations, that it would be a moment of division; instead, what it was, was a moment of national unity.
“We have unfinished business but you made a contribution that can never be taken away.”
Source: www.perthnow.com.au
