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

Section 2. Distant views


Helen Maxwell Crear (c.1827-60)

Bishopsbourne, Tasmania c.1855
pencil and charcoal drawing
T2380 NK6900/B Rex Nan Kivell Collection

Johannah and her younger sister Helen settled with their family in Tasmania in 1831. Although an amateur artist Johannah exhibited in Launceston in 1865 and at the Melbourne Public Library Exhibition in 1869. Helen Maxwell Crear died young leaving only a small collection of works. She utilised watercolour, pencil and chalk in a fresh and lively manner.

Bishopsbourne, near Launceston is the location for the Anglican theological seminary in Tasmania.

Johannah Clyne Crear (c.1824-84)

Ben Lomond, near Tullochgorum c.1855
watercolour
T2370 NK6836/F Rex Nan Kivell Collection
Valley of the South Esk c.1855
watercolour
T2375 NK9860 Rex Nan Kivell Collection


Thomas Ham (1821-70) lithographer
after
Mrs Milner Stephen (1817-87)

Steam flour mill on the Onkaparinga River 1859
lithograph
S1224

The artist was the youngest daughter of Sir John Hindmarsh, first Governor of South Australia, and she began painting scenes of the early Adelaide settlement in 1836. Mary Milner Stephen lived and painted in South Australia, Victoria, England, Heligoland (a small island off the German coast) and Sydney.

This print is particularly interesting because it was lithographed in Australia rather than being sent to England. Very few images by women artists were printed in Australia prior to the 1880s.


Augusta M. Drummond

Browns River near Hobart Town c.1870
watercolour
R4915

This watercolour was presented to the Library in 1970. Details about the artist are unknown.


Constance Frederica Gordon Cumming (1837-1924)

The Ginindarra [ie Ginninderra] Creek, looking to
Murrumbidgee Hills, County Murray, N.S. Wales, 30th Aug. 1875

watercolour on paper on canvas
R10299

This very large watercolour is inscribed with 16 names of early settlers of Canberra. The names include Marrianne Campbell and Sophia Ives Campbell both residents of Duntroon, the Campbell family home established in 1825.

Constance Cumming was a visitor to Duntroon in 1875. Born in Scotland, she was an inveterate traveller, particularly in Asia and the Pacific region. She subsequently published a number of books based on her travel journals and letters home, including At home in Fiji (1881), A lady's cruise in a French man-of-war (1882), Fire fountains of Hawaii (1883) and Wanderings in China (1886).


Jessie E. Scarvell

Waterfall in the bush 1875
oil on academy board
T364 NK826/D Rex Nan Kivell Collection

Jessie Scarvell lived in New South Wales and was a landscape painter in oil and watercolour. This work is typical of her oeuvre as she was particularly fond of water scenes. The details of her life are unknown but we do know she was active in painting circles from 1875 to 1898.

This oil was purchased by Rex Nan Kivell in the United Kingdom and subsequently sold to the National Library of Australia. In the Rex Nan Kivell Collection there are many works by women artists but few oil paintings. Jessie Scarvell's paintings are among the earliest oils by a woman artist held in the Library's collection.


Molly D. Bamberger

When shades of evening fall c.1930
bromoil
P726

Molly Bamberger was considered a talented amateur photographer and won a major prize with the Photographic Society of New South Wales in 1942. Her photographs are very much in the Pictorialist style with their soft lighting and blurred edges.


Elsie Tudor (1905-75)

Dawn on the Mitchell River, Victoria 1930s
gelatin silver (printed 1978)
P675/14

Elsie Tudor worked as a photographer's retoucher at the Burlington Studios in Melbourne during the 1920s. Using a Folding Pocket Kodak Camera, she concentrated on rural and coastal scenery near Melbourne. A number of her photographs were awarded prizes in the landscape photography sections at the Royal Melbourne Show between 1927 and 1935. Her career ceased after her marriage in 1933.


Hedda Morrison (1908-91)

Eight views in the Flinders Ranges c.1971
gelatin silver
P654/1-8

Hedda Morrison worked extensively in China and South East Asia and has been considered one of the finest photographers to have ever worked in Asia. She published widely and her books include: Sarawak, vanishing world (1957) and Travels of a photographer in China 1933-46 (1987).

Hedda Morrison was one of only two Australian photographers whose work was hung in the ground-breaking international photographic exhibition The Family of Man, 1954. Her life's work is now housed in institutions in Australia and the USA. A large exhibition of her work was shown at the National Library of Australia in 1994.


Sally Morgan (b.1951)

Wanamurraganya 1989
screenprint artist's proof
R10983

This print shows the twin influences of Sally Morgan's formal training and Aboriginal background. It is a good example of her technique and imagination. Her art has been exhibited widely in Australia and overseas. In 1993 she was commissioned by the United Nations to produce an image for their Human Rights Stamp Series.


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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