Australian Women's Art
in the National Library's Collections

Section 1. Over the back fence


Sophia Campbell (1777-1833)

Newcastle, Christ Church in the distance c.1818
watercolour in her sketchbook assembled c.1816-25
R7273 Ferguson Collection


Sophia Campbell was the first woman artist to portray Australian life and scenery.

This is an early view of the penal settlement, Newcastle and Christ Church, which had just been built. The plans for Christ Church had been drawn up from an original design by Mrs Elizabeth Macquarie.


Amelia C. Rusden (working c.1834-40)

Roman Catholic Chapel, Sydney, July, 1834
watercolour
R9985

This painting illustrates Sydney's early history as a mostly unplanned city in which buildings and thoroughfares often stood in uneasy relationship with each other.


Fanny Gibbes

Point Piper Jan. 3, 1838
pencil drawing
R4874


Fanny Gibbes was the daughter of the Collector of Customs and lived at Henrietta Villa at Point Piper. The view is probably from the verandah of her home. The quality of this work is typical of the artistic prowess of gentlewomen in the nineteenth century for whom skill in drawing was highly desirable.


Thomas Coleman Dibdin (1810-93) lithographer
after
Louisa Clifton (1814-80)

A view of Koombana Bay on Port Leschenault,
Australind, Western Australia c.1842

hand coloured lithograph
S1113

Louisa Clifton was the daughter of the commissioner of the Western Australian Company. She and her family had arrived in 1841 in Australind, now part of the town of Bunbury. This lithograph is one of the earliest images of Western Australia.


Jane Dorothea Cannan (1823-61)

Grave of Louisa Cannan c.1855
pencil drawing in her sketchbook
R9816

This poignant drawing reveals a mother's grief at losing her nine-month-old child. The grave was located in the St Kilda cemetery. There are numerous nineteenth-century drawings of graves in the National Library's collection; a reminder of the frail nature of life in colonial Australia. Jane Cannan was married to a businessman who sold iron products such as galvanised iron for buildings. Her sketchbook contains many pencil drawings of Melbourne's views, streets and dwellings, mostly unidentified.


M. & N. Hanhart lithographers
after
Elizabeth Hudspeth (1820-58)

Eden, Twofold Bay, Australia c.1855
coloured lithograph
U2108 NK503/B Rex Nan Kivell Collection

This print is one of four images drawn by Elizabeth Husdpeth while on a visit to Australia in the 1850s. Other images are: Boyd Town, Twofold Bay and the Custom House at Eden where she stayed. There is also a print of Ben Lomond in Tasmania. In letters to a friend, Mary Mowle, Elizabeth related the difficulties she had getting her drawings lithographed in London. The location of her original drawings is unknown.


Sarah Ann Fogg (1829-1922)

Quamby Bluff from Westbury, Tasmania c.1860
watercolour
R7633

Joan Kerr in The dictionary of Australian artists (1994) has identified numerous paintings by Sarah Ann Fogg. This watercolour of an area west of Launceston and her other paintings of around Launceston are considered to be her finest works.


Anne Higgins

Shan-a-cawbeen 1881
oil on canvas
R11086 Palmer Collection

This small oil painting depicts the slab cottage built by Anne's son, Henry Bournes Higgins, on his selection between Narre Warren and Gembrook, now suburban Melbourne. Henry Bournes Higgins had a distinguished career as a politician and judge.


Katherine Lilian Farran

The Creel at Thredbo, 1.3.10, drawn 1910
ink drawing
R11102

Katherine Lilian and her mother Isabel, also an artist, lived near Moss Vale, New South Wales, in the early years of this century. They were members of a large family who owned an orchard in the area. Their art was a hobby rather than a full-time occupation. There are numerous sketchbooks in the National Library which show their artistic ability and their interest in buildings in Sydney and New South Wales.


Eirene Mort (1879-1977)

Sydney in the early twenties The Heads 1922
Sydney in the early twenties The City skyline 1922
two watercolours
pages II and III in her: Tracks part 1, Sydney and the South Coast
R4975-R4976

Eirene Mort established a professional Australian art and design studio with Nora Weston in 1906 in Sydney.

Training and experience in London had convinced both women that they were indeed Australians and they returned with a mission to promote Australian products, the use of Australian subject matter and the development of Australian design. (Margaret Mort, 'Eirene Mort, a biographical memoir', Old Canberra: a sketchbook of the 1920s, 1987)


Olive Cotton (b.1911)

Sesquicentenary procession, Sydney 1938
gelatin silver (printed 1987)
P382
City rooftops 1942
gelatin silver (printed 1990)
P383

Early in her career Olive Cotton worked in Max Dupain's studio, managing the studio from 1942 to 1945. It is from this studio that these photographs originate. After a long period away from photography she resumed her career in 1964, opening a studio in Cowra specialising in portraiture. In 1985 a retrospective exhibition of her photographs was held at the Australian Centre for Photography in Sydney in recognition of her contribution to photography in Australia.


Barbara Hanrahan (1939-91

Spring time in the Botanic Gardens 1986
coloured lithograph [z210]
From: Visions of Adelaide:
a folio of five lithographs by five Adelaide artists
(Adelaide: Adelaide City Council, 1988)

Barbara Hanrahan was a very gifted printmaker, painter, novelist and teacher. In 1988 she was one of five artists commissioned by the Adelaide City Council to portray the city. The perspective of the viewer towards the women, looking from the ground upwards is a popular technique in Hanrahan's oeuvre. The National Library has a large collection of Hanrahan's prints and manuscripts.


To MainMain
To IntroductionIntroduction
To Section 1Section 1. Over the Back Fence
To Section 2Section 2. Distant Views
To Section 3Section 3. Childrens Lives
To Section 4Section 4. Artists Books
To Section 5Section 5. Gardens, Plants and Bird
To Section 6Section 6. Self and Others
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