Artist: Frances Hodgkins
Date: c.1929
Medium: Oil on canvas
Dimensions: 62.5 x 76 cm
Credit: Towner Collection, the Lucy Wertheim Bequest. Image Towner Eastbourne
Frances Hodgkins was born in Dunedin, New Zealand and studied there at the College of Art. She is widely regarded as New Zealand’s leading expatriate artist. In 1901 she travelled to London and Europe to further her study of drawing and painting. Her professional life spanned 56 years during which time her style evolved from impressionistic watercolours to 20th century modernism, many of them landscapes but also including portraits and still life. All are distinguished by a strong use of colour. Like Christopher Wood she was invited to be a member of the Seven and Five Society which exhibited annually and is regarded as a significant and influential avant-garde group of the interwar period.