Essay by Luke Foster
“Honest work. How many people have the opportunity to be a part of that? To watch that sort of good surgery being done on cataract-blind people warms your soul.”
Fred Hollows
I wrote an essay about the amazing work of the Fred Hollows Foundation years ago and it features in my book Mothers Love. I am also currently working on three installation instructions and one of them is for the Fred Hollows foundation. I am aiming to have it finished before my next solo show in little over a month.
Some days when I can afford it, I go without a coffee to donate $5 to a charity and its most often the Fred Hollows Foundation or Oxfam.
“Every eye is an eye. When you are doing surgery there, that is just as important as if you were doing eye surgery on the Prime Minister or King.”
Fred Hollows
I love this quote by Fred and it shows how he treated all people equally.
For around $25 an eye operation can treat people in the developing world and restore sight to blind people.
“The quality of humaneness comes from having a concern for…people less fortunate, so too does the humanity of a country, which will be determined by the extent to which it helps countries less fortunate than itself.”
Fred Hollows
I agree with this quote by Fred completely and I feel Australia is a very altruistic country both at a national level and individually in healing people and other countries less fortunate.
I can understand how important vision is as I am an artist and had an eye operation on a cataract on my right eye at Gold Coast University Hospital a little over a week ago and feel relieved as due to being an artist I need to have good vision into my old age so I can draw every day for the rest of my life.

“It’s been 23 years since celebrated Kiwi eye surgeon Fred Hollows died of cancer, but his widow Gabi still sees his face everywhere.
It’s hard not to – his portrait is plastered on bus stops and alongside bequests for the Fred Hollows Foundation – you’ll even see his name on the back of rickshaws in Bangladesh.”
Now to Love Website

In conclusion Gabi and the team continue Fred’s amazing legacy with pursuing his charity around the world restoring sight to blind people in the developing world. I am going to sacrifice a coffee today to donate $5 to the Fred Hollows foundation.