New Zealand Prints 1900-1950: an Unseen Heritage
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NEW ZEALAND PRINTS 1900-1950: AN UNSEEN HERITAGE A thesis submitted in fulfilment of the requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy in the University of Canterbury by Gail Macdonald Ross University of Canterbury 2006 TABLE OF CONTENTS VOLUME ONE ABSTRACT i ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS iii DEDICATION v ABBREVIATIONS vi NOTE ABOUT IMAGES vii LIST OF FIGURES viii INTRODUCTION 1 CHAPTER ONE: 1900-1919: THE EMERGENCE OF THE 17 CREATIVE PRINT 1.1 Auckland Printmaking 21 1.2 Wellington Printmaking 33 1.3 Christchurch Printmaking 39 1.4 Dunedin Printmaking 44 1.5 Conclusion 46 CHAPTER TWO: THE 1920s: THE REGIONALIST PRINT 47 2.1 End of Quoin Club Regionalism 48 2.2 La Trobe Regionalist Printmakers 51 2.3 Impact of Advertising Art on Regionalist Printmaking 56 2.4 Regionalist Prints 60 2.4.1 City & Working Life 60 2.4.2 Landscapes 66 2.4.3 Flora & Fauna 69 2.4.4 Mori 72 2.5 Expatriate Printmakers 76 2.6 Bookplates, Book Illustrations & Printed Textiles 83 2.7 The Rising Status of the Print 89 2.8 Conclusion 93 CHAPTER THREE: THE 1930s: THE DEMOCRATIC PRINT 94 3.1 Social Realist Prints 99 3.2 Experimental Prints 109 3.3 Regionalist Prints 116 3.3.1 The Unspoiled Landscape 117 3.3.2 Flora & Fauna 122 3.3.3 Mori 125 3.4 Expatriate Printmakers 127 3.5 Bookplates 141 3.6 Conclusion 143 CHAPTER FOUR: THE 1940s: THE PATRIOTIC PRINT 147 4.1 The Impact of Cultural Nationalism on Printmaking 151 4.2 Prints of National Identity 154 4.2.1 A Green & Pleasant Land 155 4.2.2 Emblematic Flora & Fauna 166 4.2.3 A Mori Pantheon 171 4.2.4 The Distant War 181 4.3 Expatriate Printmakers 184 4.4 Book Illustration, Bookplates & Printed Textiles 191 4.5 Changes in Printmaking Training 198 4.6 Conclusion 201 CONCLUSION 205 BIBLIOGRAPHY 216 TABLE OF CONTENTS VOLUME TWO NOTE ABOUT IMAGES i KEY TO PLATES ii LIST OF PLATES (Numerical) iii LIST OF PLATES (By Artist) xiii COLLECTIONS GUIDE xix PLATES 1-156 PRINTMAKERS’ SURVEY 2-1 – 2-109 i ABSTRACT The vibrant school of printmaking which emerged and flourished in New Zealand between 1900 and 1950 forms the subject of this thesis. It examines the attitudes of the printmakers, many of whom regarded the print as the most democratic of art forms and one that should reflect the realities of everyday life. Their subject matter, contemporary city scenes, people at work and leisure, local landscapes, Mori and indigenous flora and fauna, is analysed and revealed as anticipating by over a decade that of regionalist painters. They are also identified as the first New Zealand artists to draw attention to social and environmental issues. Trained under the British South Kensington art education system, New Zealand printmakers placed great importance on craftsmanship. Although some worked in a realist style others experimented with abstraction and surrealism, placing them among the forefront of New Zealand artists receptive to modern art. Expatriate New Zealand printmakers played significant roles in three major printmaking movements abroad, the Artists’ International Alliance, Atelier 17 and the Claude Flight Linocut Movement. The thesis redresses the failure of existing histories of New Zealand art to recognise the existence of a major twentieth-century art movement. It identifies the main factors contributing to the low status of printmaking in New Zealand. Commercial artists rather than those with a fine arts background led the Quoin Club, which initiated a New Zealand school of printmaking in 1916; Gordon Tovey’s overthrow of the South Kensington system in 1945 devalued the craftsmanship so important to printmakers; and the rise of modernism, which gave priority to formal values and abstraction, further exacerbated institutional indifference to the print. The adoption of Mori imagery by printmakers resulted in recent art historians retrospectively accusing them of cultural appropriation. Even the few printmakers who attained some recognition were criticised for their involvement in textile and bookplate design and book-illustration. Key artists discussed in the thesis include James Boswell, Stephen Champ, Frederick Coventry, Rona Dyer, Arnold Goodwin, Thomas Gulliver, Trevor Lloyd, Stewart Maclennan, Gilbert Meadows, John L. Moore, E. Mervyn Taylor, Arthur ii Thompson, Herbert Tornquist, Frank Weitzel, Hilda Wiseman, George Woods, John Buckland Wright and Adele Younghusband. Details of the approximately 3,000 prints created during this period are recorded in a database, and summarised in the Printmakers’ Survey included in Volume Two. In addition reproductions of 156 prints are illustrated and documented; while a further 43 prints are reproduced within the text of Volume One. iii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I would like to thank my supervisors Dr. Jillian Cassidy and Associate Professor Ian Lochhead for their encouragement, and Cathryn Shine for advice on the technicalities of printmaking. Artists Rona Dyer, Valerie Lewis, Ron Stenberg and Allan Swinton kindly provided recollections about their art training. Sadly, many other printmakers of the era are now deceased, but their families, friends and colleagues generously supplied research material. I would particularly like to thank John Bagnall, Jean & Martin Ellis, Josephine Forbes, Graeme Gummer, Dudley Meadows, Ron Meadows, Michele Moore, Sebastian Page, Ray Richards, former Managing Director of A.H. & A. W. Reed Publishing, Terence Taylor, Jean & Erik Thomasson, Richard Tornquist, Ian Thwaites and Barry Woods. Similarly, contemporary dealers and collectors were an invaluable source of information, and thanks are due to Ann Andrews, Suellen Aitcheson, Peter Burton, Dr Roger Collins, Rebecca Hamid, Warwick Henderson, Peter Jarvis, Steve Marson, Jim McCready, Robert Newton, Professor David Skegg and Hamish Walsh. Contemporary printmakers who provided comment about their predecessors included Barry Cleavin, Ted Dutch, Kees Hos, Campbell Smith and Marilynn Webb. I had the good fortune to be assisted in my research by many curators including: Jane Davidson, Auckland Art Gallery; Tony Mackle, Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa; Barbara Brownlie, Alexander Turnbull Library; Amanda Wayers, Salme Kortet and Bev Eng, Dowse Art Gallery; Mary-Jane Duffy, New Zealand Ministry of Foreign Affairs & Trade Art Collection; Neil Roberts and Peter Vangioni, Christchurch Art Gallery; Genevieve Webb, Dunedin Public Art Gallery; Linda Tyler, Anna Peterson and Pennie Hunt, Hocken Collection, University of Otago. Outside of the main regional centres, assistance was provided by Pauline Farquhar, Waikato Museum of Art & History; Tyler Cann, Len Lye Collection, Govett Brewster Gallery; Susanne Geiser, Te Manawa Museum & Gallery; Cherie Meecham, Rotorua Museum of Art & History; Judith Taylor, Suter Gallery; Daniel McKnight, Hawke's Bay Art Gallery and Museum; Dr Fiona Ciaran, Aigantighe Gallery; Marcella Currie, Ashburton Art Gallery; Jim Geddes, Eastern Southland Gallery; Rob Douglas, Forrester Gallery Oamaru; Denis iv Rainforth, Sarjeant Gallery; Bronwyn Reid, Wairarapa Arts Centre; and Joanne Moselen, Whangarei Art Museum. I would also like to thank Dr Roger Butler and Anne McDonald of the National Gallery of Australia, Deborah Jones, Art Gallery of New South Wales and Catherine Flood of the Victoria & Albert Museum for their assistance. Among the librarians, archivists and other academics I would like to thank are: Caroline McBride and Catherine Hammond, E. H. McCormick Research Library, Auckland Art Gallery; Jane Dodd, Elam Archive, Fine Arts Library, University of Auckland; Stephen Innes, Special Collections, University of Auckland; Peter Simpson, University of Auckland; Kate de Courcy, Special Collections, Auckland City Library; Diane Gordon, Auckland War Memorial Museum; Ian Thwaites, Auckland Ex Libris Society; Roger Blackley, University of Victoria, Wellington; Susan Superville and Jennifer Twist, Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa; Jane Shallcross, Wellington High School Library; Kate Fraser and Trish McCormack, Archives New Zealand; Lissa Mitchell, The Film Archive; Tim Jones, Christchurch Art Gallery; Robin Stevens and Max Podstolski, University of Canterbury Library; Max Broadbent, Macmillan Brown Library, University of Canterbury; Devon Sinclair & Douglas Horrell, School of Fine Art Library, University of Canterbury; Kerry McCarthy, Canterbury Museum Research Centre; Louis Young, Ferrymead Printing Museum Christchurch; Dr Mark Stocker and Dr Donald Kerr, University of Otago; Ian Stewart, Special Collections, Dunedin Public Library; Kathryn Mercer, Waikato Museum of Art & History; and Glenis Needham, Hamilton City Libraries. I am indebted to fellow PhD student Melinda Johnston for her insightful comments about the thesis as it progressed. My research was funded by the Canterbury Branch of the New Zealand Federation of University Women, and I thank the Federation for its support. v DEDICATION To Lawrence Roberts with much gratitude for your constant encouragement. vi ABBREVIATIONS A.I.A. Artists’ International Alliance ASA Auckland Society of Arts CSA Canterbury Society of Arts DNZB Dictionary of New Zealand Biography NZAFA New Zealand Academy of Fine Arts NRAM National Register of Archives, New Zealand NZSOA New Zealand Society of Artists OAS Otago Art Society W.E.A. Workers’ Educational Association vii NOTE ABOUT IMAGES All the figures are located within the text of Volume One and plates in Volume Two. Titles of prints have not been shortened but have been given in the format used by the artists, including their abbreviations. I would like to thank the copyright holders who gave permission