AUSTRALIAN WOMEN ARTISTS BETWEEN THE WARS 3 March – 25 April 2015

LAURAINE • DIGGINS • FINE • ART COVER BESSIE ELLEN DAVIDSON 1879 – 1965 Still Life with Flowers and Pears oil on cardboard 61 x 46 cm signed lower right: Bessie Davidson

n the period between the wars, Australian women artists were leading the way by challenging traditions and exploring new Iideas in art with a focus on colour, form and design, and subjects such as urban culture. Role models like , and had provided women with a basis to seriously pursue art as a profession. Circumstances and opportunity1 saw a flourishing of female artists establish a career through dedicated studies at a growing number of art schools, combined with travel overseas and, quite often, financial independence. BESSIE ELLEN DAVIDSON 1879 – 1965 was continued but rather (Family Group) oil on canvas than romanticised landscapes concerned with 46 x 38 cm effects of light, the rise of the modern woman signed lower right: B.D. artist painted the landscape familiar to them with an adventurous attitude towards colour: from the buses and telegraph poles of Beckett’s Harbour Bridge. Women artists tackled bayside suburbs; to the South a wide variety of subjects, including those Australian landscapes of Sauerbier; urban scenes more accepted in the male domain, and which such as Tempe Manning’s Princes Street and the modern women now inhabited. Rix Nicholas intimate depictions of home or studio as seen in ventured out to capture Australians in remote Gurdon’s Under the Window and as favoured by rural areas as seen in the well-known Fair Cossington Smith. Musterer (1935, QAG) and as in Boy on a Horse. Whilst there was no overall identifying was the first woman awarded the modernist movement, a common experience Archibald Prize4 and appointed as an official of nearly all the women represented in war artist in 1943, as was Sybil Craig in 1945. this exhibition was travel and studies Printmaking was also a key to the rise of 1879 – 1966 overseas, particularly to Paris and London2, , most effectively by as The Sewing Basket where the exposure to influences such as seen in The Parish Hall and also by Mabel Pye watercolour on paper postimpressionism, modernism, , and Lisette Kohlhagen. Greater commercial 13.5 x 14 cm shaped each individual artist’s and domestic design opportunities were a signed lower right: Thea Proctor subsequent style. further important influence, including murals Seemingly traditional and feminine subjects as undertaken by Haxton5 and the frieze-like such as still lifes, flowers, intimate interior and Country Morning by Moxham. leisure scenes and were invigorated through There is an ever-growing understanding the work of artists such as Proctor (The Sewing and appreciation of women artists and their Basket); Preston (Flowers) and Davidson, who influence in shaping , from ‘lost’ maintained her career in France3. Women moderns6 to the household names such as artists were also exploring more modern and Preston and Cossington Smith. urban subjects, such as Craig’s HMAS Cerberus and the iconic renditions of the building of the • Footnotes are located at the end of price list. TEMPE MANNING 1896 – 1960 Princes Street, Looking South 1927 oil on board 37 x 44 cm signed lower left: Tempe Manning

GRACE COSSINGTON SMITH 1892 – 1984 The Blue Vase oil on pulp board 61.5 x 45.5 cm signed lower left: Cossington Smith

HILDA RIX NICHOLAS 1864 – 1961 The Fruits of the Farm c.1914 coloured crayons on paper 44.8 x 29.5 cm unsigned

CLARICE BECKETT 1887 – 1935 Morning Ride oil on canvas on pulpboard 29.5 x 35 cm unsigned HILDA RIX NICHOLAS 1884 – 1961 (Boy on Horse) oil on canvas 51 x 61 cm signed lower left: EHRix Nicholas

JANE PRICE 1860 - 1948 Sunrise oil on canvas on board 33.5 x 49 cm signed lower right: J R Price

DORRIT BLACK 1891 – 1951 The Parish Hall 1937 colour linocut on oriental wove paper 23 x 36 cm signed lower right: Dorrit Black and inscribed lower left: The Parish Hall 6/50 NORA HEYSEN 1911- 2003 (Woman in Interior) charcoal on paper 35.5 x 25.5 cm signed lower left: Nora Heysen

NORA GURDON 1885 - 1973 Under the Window 1922 ETHEL CARRICK FOX 1872 - 1952 44.5 x 54.5 cm (Arabs Walking Down a Street) c. 1920s signed lower right: N Gurdon oil on canvas 45.7 x 37.9 cm signed lower right: Carrick Fox FRANCES VIDA LAHEY 1882 – 1968 Customs House, Hobart 1929 oil on composition board 41 x 51 cm signed: Lower right: V. Lahey

MARGARET PRESTON 1875 – 1963 Flowers 1929 oil on canvas KATHLEEN SAUERBIER 1903 – 1991 53.4 x 45.8 cm Landscape (possibly Fertile Valley) 1935 signed lower right: 1929 oil on canvas on board 1890 – 1979 54 x 68 cm The Excavation 1921 signed lower right: K Sauerbier 1935 oil on canvas 34.3 x 24.3 cm signed lower left: Grace Crowley 1921

SYBIL CRAIG 1901 - 1989 (HMAS Cerberus, Half Moon Bay, Melbourne) c.1920s oil on paper 44.8 x 49.3 cm signed lower left: Sybil Craig MIRIAM MOXHAM 1885 – 1971 Country Morning c. 1940 oil on composition board 94 x 182 cm signed lower right: Miriam Moxham

BESSIE ELLEN DAVIDSON 1879 – 1965 The Laundry Boat on the River Seine, Paris oil on cardboard 18 x 21 cm signed lower left: BD

NORA HEYSEN 1911 – 2003 1892 – 1984 (Self Portrait) 1936 Studio Doorway c.1954 charcoal on paper oil on composition board 35 x 25 cm 63.5 x 48 cm signed lower left: Nora Heysen signed lower left: G Cossington Smith and dated lower right: 36 BESSIE ELLEN DAVIDSON 1879 – 1965 Autumn Table at Villeneuve 1935 oil on plywood 44 x 82 cm unsigned

ESTHER PATERSON 1892 – 1971 (Shopping Day) oil on pulpboaard 59 x 55cm signed lower left: Esther Paterson

CLARICE BECKETT 1887 – 1935 MABEL PYE 1894 – 1982 The Red Bus Blue Vase c.1936 oil on canvas on composition board colour linocut 36.5 x 44 cm 22.7 x 18.7 cm unsigned signed lower right: M Pye and inscribed lower left: Blue Vase LAURAINE • DIGGINS • FINE • ART

5 Malakoff Street, North Caulfield, Vic 3161 Email: [email protected] Gallery Hours: Tues - Fri 10am - 6pm, Tel: (61 3) 9509 9855 Website: www.diggins.com.au Sat 1pm - 5pm