Frances Hodgkins (1869—1947)
Frances Hodgkins is to New Zealand painting what Katherine Mansfield is to literature—an artist of international standing. She became one of New Zealand’s best known 20th century expatriate artists, acclaimed as a leading British modernist artist who inspired a younger generation of artists including Barbara Hepworth, Ben Nicholson, Christopher Wood, John Piper and others. Frances Hodgkins was selected to represent Britain at the Venice Biennale in 1940—a huge triumph at the time—but this pinnacle to her career was not realised due to the growing disruptions caused by World War Two.
Frances Hodgkins was born in Dunedin, the daughter of William Mathew Hodgkins, a lawyer and keen amateur artist who helped found the Otago Arts Society and the Dunedin Public Art Gallery. She died in England in 1947 and her ashes were later brought back to New Zealand and are interred in the family plot in Waikanae cemetery, where her sister Isabel, mother Rachel, brother-in-law Will Field and other family members were also buried.
By leaving New Zealand and basing herself in Europe Frances Hodgkins was exposed to, excited by and responded to the radical developments in European art in the early years of the 20th century—Fauvism, Cubism and Futurism, amongst others. Consequently her work continued to develop throughout her life. As Linda Gill notes, ‘Change and variety, incessant questioning and exploration are the hallmarks of Hodgkins’ work. She did not settle early into a recognisable style like her contemporaries Margaret Stoddart, Dorothy Kate Richmond, or Sydney Lough Thompson, but continued to respond to the challenges of modernism in her own way and at her own pace.’ (Linda Gill, ‘Some notes on the twenty-four pictures by Frances Hodgkins in the Field Collection’, Frances Hodgkins in Kāpiti: The Field Collection, 2014, Mahara Gallery, p 21).
Isabel Field (1867–1950)
A popular and successful artist in the late 19th century, Isabel Field (née Hodgkins) was born in Dunedin, the elder daughter of painter William Mathew Hodgkins and sister of Frances Hodgkins. She inherited her father’s artistic talent and responded quickly to his tuition, accompanying him on sketching expeditions.
The quality of Isabel’s finely judged compositions with their fluid watercolour technique and vivid palette gained early recognition and she exhibited her landscapes and flower subjects regularly from 1884 at the Otago Art Society and Canterbury Society of Arts. In 1888 she was included in the New Zealand section of the Centennial Exhibition in Melbourne, perhaps the high point of a career that continued until about 1900. Her work always attracted favourable reviews, sold well and prompted admiration from her sister:
‘Your pictures are splendid! And I am glad to be able to tell you that one is sold. “Tranquill Waters” Dr Roberts bought it. It is simply wonderful to me how much you have improved and to every one else too—you must have been storing it all up and the result is beyond all expectations. I was prepared to be critical but I must confess I could only admire when I saw them.’
Frances Hodgkins to Isabel Field, 12 November 1899, Castle St.
In 1893 Isabel married politician William Hughes Field and had little time for painting with family and social duties taking precedence. She continued to support Frances Hodgkins, through letters and occasional financial gifts, and by providing a home base at the family farm in Waikanae for work sent back from Europe. The Field family’s legacy is the Field Collection, created through the efforts of Isabel and Will Field’s son Peter Field to keep the family’s art collection together.
Girolamo Pieri Nerli (1863–1926)
Girolamo Pieri Pecci Ballati Nerli, usually known as Girolamo Pieri Nerli or Girolamo Nerli was one of three professional painters, including Petrus van der Velden and James Nairn, who settled in New Zealand in the late 19th century. Through their work and teaching they introduced artists to the new developments that were happening in European art. He taught or influenced A H O’Keeffe, Grace Joel and Frances Hodgkins.
Nerli was born in Siena, Italy, on 21 February 1860, the son of an Italian aristocrat, Ferdinando Pieri Nerli, and his wife Henrietta Medwin, an Englishwoman. After studying art in Florence, in 1885 Nerli moved to Australia. He was an associate of the Heidelberg painters, and an important influence on Charles Conder (1868–1909).
Nerli made his first appearance in Dunedin in 1889 where he set up the New South Wales Court at the New Zealand and South Seas Exhibition. Nine of his paintings were shown as part of the New South Wales Loan Collection. William Mathew Hodgkins who was overseeing the exhibition probably met Nerli at this time and this was the beginning of the Hodgkins family’s brief but important association with the artist. Both William Mathew and Frances received painting tuition from Nerli and at first Frances found his teaching stimulating. He introduced her to figure painting and portraiture, and his dashing painting style characterised by free brushwork and ‘unfinished’ looking compositions was new and exciting. William Mathew collected and promoted Nerli’s work, lending pictures from his own collection to Otago Art Society’s 1893 exhibition.
Nerli was elected to the council of the Otago Art Society in 1893, and in February 1894, he opened the Otago Art Academy with artists J D Perrett (1859–1937) and L W Wilson (1851–1912). In February 1895, the Dunedin School of Art and Design hired Nerli as the painting tutor but the following year he left Dunedin, and New Zealand altogether in 1898.
William Mathew Hodgkins (1833–1898)
Amateur artist and art historian, William Mathew Hodgkins was also a mover and shaker in the early days of Dunedin’s art circles.
Hodgkins arrived in Dunedin in 1862 and married Rachel Parker in the same year. He was a lawyer by profession, but his legacy to New Zealand is in art, and not only because he was the father of two talented daughters Isabel and Frances. He founded the Otago Art Society and in 1880 became its second president, a position he held until his death. His lecture on art at the Otago Institute in 1880 established him as one of New Zealand’s first art historians. He was an enthusiastic member of the Art Club (a sketching club of amateurs who met regularly to paint) and he was one of the champions for the establishment of the Dunedin Public Art Gallery.
William Mathew Hodgkins’ watercolour views of the South Island countryside were painted in the romantic, atmospheric style of J M W Turner (1775–1851), and his considerable influence meant that this style of landscape painting prevailed amongst his contemporaries.
Edmund Thomas Gouldsmith RBA RWA (1852–1932)
Born in Bristol, Edmund Gouldsmith studied painting at the Royal College of Art in London. He moved to New Zealand via Australia in 1886 to take up the part-time position of Art Master at Christ’s college in Christchurch. His carefully observed and beautifully coloured landscapes in oil and watercolour were exhibited at the Canterbury Society of Arts, as well as the Otago Art Society, Auckland Society of Arts and the New Zealand Academy of Fine Arts. He was also represented at the 1888 Melbourne Centennial Exhibition and the 1889–90 NZ and South Seas Exhibition.
Gouldsmith’s acquaintance with the Hodgkins family was probably through the Otago Art Society and he may have taken part in sketching expeditions, including the ascent of Mt Sefton in which William Mathew Hodgkins was also involved. He also made an offer of marriage to Isabel Hodgkins, but this came to nothing. Frances Hodgkins was enthusiastic about his work. She wrote to Isabel in 1897 about ‘Mr Gouldsmith’s beautiful fresh oils…with the color [sic] as fresh as when he first painted them’ on exhibition at the Otago Art Society.
In 1891 Gouldsmith returned to England and continued to exhibit his work with the Royal Society of British Artists, Royal Scottish Academy and the Royal Institute of Painters in Watercolours.
John Gully (1819–1898)
John Gully was the most successful New Zealand landscape artist of the last decade of the 19th century. Gully was a largely self-taught artist, but the somewhat formulaic composition and execution of his paintings did not affect his popularity with the public who loved his large-scale watercolour views of Milford Sound, Lake Manapouri and other scenic locations.
Gully was born in Bath, England where he served his apprenticeship as a draughtsman in an iron foundry. After reading Hursthouse’s ‘Account of the Settlement of New Plymouth’, Gully emigrated to New Zealand with his wife and three children in 1852. At first the family settled in Taranaki, and Gully undertook various jobs including farming and office work. He also took some private art students. In 1860 the Taranaki land wars caused Gully to move with his family to Nelson where for a time he was part-time art master at Nelson College.
In 1863 he was employed as a draughtsman at the Department of Lands and Survey, Nelson, under James Crowe Richmond (1822–1898) and Julius von Haast (1822–1887) and it was here that he made full-scale paintings of von Haast’s sketches of the New Zealand landscape. Gully was encouraged and promoted by William Mathew Hodgkins and James Crowe Richmond (1822–1898) and they accompanied each other on painting exhibitions.
Petrus van der Velden (1837–1913)
Petrus van der Velden came to New Zealand from The Netherlands in June 1890 and settled in Christchurch. Like Girolamo Nerli, he was a professional artist with significant European standing, and for New Zealand artists, he provided a link with European art. He was a member of the Hague School and had taken part in the movement in the 1870s to regenerate Dutch painting. He had known Jozef Israels, Jacob Maris and Anton Mauve and shared their aesthetic of romantic realism.
Within a short time van der Velden achieved a major reputation in Christchurch, exhibiting regularly with the art societies there and in Dunedin. In November 1890 he exhibited Dutch funeral, the largest of his paintings of everyday life of the fishing people on the island of Marken, at the Canterbury Society of Arts. A trip to Otira Gorge in 1891 led to the discovery of the rugged landscape subject that continued to inspire him to the end of his life. In 1894 van der Velden began teaching from his Durham Street studio; his pupils included Sydney Lough Thompson, Robert Proctor, Cecil Kelly, Elizabeth Kelly, Leonard Booth and Raymond McIntyre.
Although van der Velden was highly regarded, his work sold for less than he expected leading to financial difficulties. In 1898 he went to Sydney, returning to New Zealand in 1904, where he lived in Wellington and continued to exhibit there and in Christchurch. He died in Auckland in 1913 and is buried in Waikaraka Cemetery.
James McLachlan Nairn (1859–1904)
A painter of landscapes and portraits, Scottish-born artist James McLachlan Nairn also introduced a fresh approach to art teaching to New Zealand. His paintings featured an experimental approach to colour and a muted Impressionist style shown in his interest in the effects of light on surfaces at different times of the day. Nairn’s influence was felt throughout New Zealand. He regularly sent paintings to art societies in the other centres which established his reputation as the country’s leading modern painter after Girolamo Nerli returned to Australia in 1898.
Nairn was born at Aberfoyle near Glasgow, Scotland. After leaving school he was apprenticed as a draughtsman in an architect’s office. While working there he studied part time at the Glasgow School of Art for four years from 1879. By 1889 Nairn was an established member of the group of Scottish early modern artists, the Glasgow Boys. In reaction to the conservatism of the Royal Scottish Academy, the group expressed their right to paint the subjects of their choice in the way they wished. These were often contemporary rural subjects painted out of doors, directly in front of their subjects in an unsentimental, naturalistic style.
Ill health led to Nairn’s decision to emigrate to New Zealand in 1890. He arrived in Dunedin and immediately introduced himself into art circles there. His recent seascapes were shown to Dunedin artists at a private dinner held by David Con Hutton and he read a paper on decorative art to students at the Otago School of Art in late July 1890, before moving to Wellington.
In 1891 Nairn was appointed teacher at the Wellington School of Design (later Wellington Technical College). He was a popular teacher and often controversial, receiving much public criticism both for his Impressionistic style and for instituting a life drawing class. He was elected to the council of the New Zealand Academy of Fine Arts, but in 1892, unhappy that artists had little influence in the running of the Academy, he led a breakaway group to form the Wellington Art Club who for some years held their own exhibitions. His ‘Pumpkin Cottage’ rented at Silverstream in 1894 became a gathering place for artists.
From 1891 until 1898 Nairn had exhibited work alongside Frances Hodgkins at the Otago Art Society and from the sale catalogue of William Mathew Hodgkins’ paintings at his death in 1898, we know that the Hodgkins family owned at least one of Nairn’s paintings.
Nairn was a keen practitioner of en plein air painting, and would paint and sketch outside, in all weathers. This practice led to his death in 1904: he caught a chill after sketching near Motueka and died after a short illness.
Dorothy Kate Richmond (1861–1935)
Dorothy Kate Richmond known as Dolla, and professionally as D K Richmond, was a painter of portraits, landscapes, genre scenes and still life, a teacher and a notable member of the New Zealand Academy of Fine Arts.
She was born in Parnell, Auckland, the daughter of James Crowe Richmond and Mary Smith.
Her father was a talented painter of finely observed watercolour landscapes and Richmond inherited his artistic sensibility. She visited Europe with him in 1873 where she had drawing lessons. She attended Bedford College for Women in London, and the Slade School of Fine Art where she worked under Alphonse Legros, attaining a Slade Scholarship in 1880–a rare distinction for a woman artist. When Richmond returned to Nelson in late 1880, she was one of a small group of New Zealand-born women to have received a professional training in art.
In 1883 she was appointed the art mistress at Nelson College for Girls. She made two visits to Europe in 1885 and 1889 to continue her study of art. In New Zealand she began painting oil portraits using her family and domestic help as models. In 1896 she studied in Wellington with James Nairn.
Financially independent after the death of her father in 1898, she again travelled to Europe to paint. In 1901 she met Frances Hodgkins when they both joined Norman Garstin’s sketching class in Normandy. Hodgkins described Richmond as ‘the dearest woman with the most beautiful face and expression. I am a lucky beggar to have her as a travelling companion.’ (Letter to Kate Rattray, 27 Aug 190, Linda Gill, Letters of Frances Hodgkins, 1993, Auckland University Press). Having shared classes together, Hodgkins and Richmond travelled through France, Italy, England and Holland, returning to New Zealand together in 1903. They held a joint exhibition at McGregor Wright’s Gallery in 1904, shared a studio in Bowen Street, Wellington for two years, and went on sketching trips together to Paraparaumu and Rotorua.
Richmond kept the studio on after Frances Hodgkins returned to Europe in 1906 and continued to take private art students. From around 1909 to 1924 she held classes at Fitzherbert Terrace School also known as the Samuel Marsden Collegiate School.
Richmond was associated with the New Zealand Academy of Fine Arts in Wellington for many years. She exhibited with the Academy from 1885 and was first elected to the Academy Council in 1898, receiving a life membership in 1928.
Lorna Ellis (1903—1981)
Lorna Ellis née Trengrove was a New Zealand sculptor and ceramicist, and one of the first women in New Zealand to become a full-time commercial artist.
Ellis attended the Wellington Art School for three years, at that time attached to Wellington Technical College. In the 1920s she was employed by the Goldberg Advertising Agency to draw newspaper advertisements and illustrations.
Family commitments allowed little time for art until after the end of World War II but in 1952, she helped found the Thursday Group which met for many years on Thursday evenings to draw from life.
Ellis taught weekly art classes at the Arohata Woman’s Borstal Institution, where she worked as a counsellor for 18 years. Later, Ellis was a member of ‘Group Seven’, a group of artists who met at the Hutt Art Society rooms. She attended Saturday afternoon drawing sessions at Helen Crabb’s (Barc) apartment, alongside George Woods, E Mervyn Taylor and Douglas McDiarmid.
After reading about cold-cast bronze sculpture, in 1958 Ellis went to England to learn the process. She mastered the technique and brought it back to New Zealand. She produced bronze busts of Rita Angus and E Mervyn Taylor and was commissioned to make a bronze head of Peter Field, Frances Hodgkins’ nephew and guardian of the Field Collection. Ellis was primarily a sculptor, but also worked with ceramics from the early 1970s, after being introduced to potter Lee Thompson’s kiln.
Ellis was an artist member of the New Zealand Academy of Fine Arts from 1927, and in recognition of her service was elected a life member in 1975.