Cunninghamia Date of Publication: February 2020 A journal of plant ecology for eastern Australia ISSN 0727- 9620 (print) • ISSN 2200 - 405X (Online) The Australian paintings of Marianne North, 1880–1881: landscapes ‘doomed shortly to disappear’ John Leslie Dowe Australian Tropical Herbarium, James Cook University, Smithfield, Qld 4878 AUSTRALIA.
[email protected] Abstract: The 80 paintings of Australian flora, fauna and landscapes by English artist Marianne North (1830-1890), completed during her travels in 1880–1881, provide a record of the Australian environment rarely presented by artists at that time. In the words of her mentor Sir Joseph Dalton Hooker, director of Kew Gardens, North’s objective was to capture landscapes that were ‘doomed shortly to disappear before the axe and the forest fires, the plough and the flock, or the ever advancing settler or colonist’. In addition to her paintings, North wrote books recollecting her travels, in which she presented her observations and explained the relevance of her paintings, within the principles of a ‘Darwinian vision,’ and inevitable and rapid environmental change. By examining her paintings and writings together, North’s works provide a documented narrative of the state of the Australian environment in the late nineteenth- century, filtered through the themes of personal botanical discovery, colonial expansion and British imperialism. Cunninghamia (2020) 20: 001–033 doi: 10.7751/cunninghamia.2020.20.001 Cunninghamia: a journal of plant ecology for eastern Australia © 2020 Royal Botanic Gardens and Domain Trust www.rbgsyd.nsw.gov.au/science/Scientific_publications/cunninghamia 2 Cunninghamia 20: 2020 John Dowe, Australian paintings of Marianne North, 1880–1881 Introduction The Marianne North Gallery in the Royal Botanic Gardens Kew houses 832 oil paintings which Marianne North (b.