Vol 43 no 1, February 2021
The Invisible Man
By Stephen Marshall   |   February 2021   |   Vol 43 no 1

Sometimes it is easy to find information about an artist in reference works. Sometimes information can be readily found through internet resources. Stephen Marshall, looking at wider issues of art appreciation, chose as an example William Young, who painted many watercolours around Sydney and NSW from the 1920s...

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Vol 43 no 1, February 2021
Angels in the Studio in Western Australia
By Dorothy Erickson   |   February 2021   |   Vol 43 no 1

Continuing our story of the women artists who worked in Western Australia,1 we examine the careers of those who exhibited in the Paris and Glasgow international exhibitions at the turn of the century – when Western Australia was in the midst of a Gold Rush. While Lady Forrest’s work was exhibited in a separ...

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Vol 43 no 1, February 2021
South Australian mid-19th century merchants’ tokens
By Peter Lane   |   February 2021   |   Vol 43 no 1

When small change was hard to obtain, some merchants minted and branded their own unofficial currency. Tokens were used as normal currency, accepted by everyone everywhere until British coins became readily available. Copper ‘token’ pennies and halfpennies were circulating in all the Australian colonies in ...

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Vol 43 no 1, February 2021
Feedback
By John Wade   |   February 2021   |   Vol 43 no 1

Many people help create each issue of Australiana: authors, editor, photographers, owners of items, designer, expert readers, proof-readers and other talented individuals and institutions. Once we publish, each story is pretty much set in stone, so we try to check our research, facts and conclusions first. We c...

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Vol 42 no 4, Nov 2020
Update from the President
By Colin Thomas   |   November 2020   |   Vol 42 no 4

It was an absolute privilege at the recent Annual General Meeting (AGM) to be elected President of the Society. I am very humbled by the fact that the outgoing President Dr Jim Bertouch and Vice President Tim Cha nominated me for the role with the unanimous support of the outgoing Committee and State Chairs.

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Vol 42 no 4, Nov 2020
James Cook’s Killora 'Resolution' and 'Adventure' medal
By Peter Lane   |   November 2020   |   Vol 42 no 4

Lieutenant James Cook took various gifts on his voyages of discovery, to distribute to Indigenous people whom he might encounter. Peter Lane draws attention to the only example of one of Cook’s medals found in Australia, a memento of friendly contact between the European explorers and Indigenous Tasmanians in...

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Vol 42 no 4, Nov 2020
Tasmanian Magnificence part 2
By R.A. Fredman   |   November 2020   |   Vol 42 no 4

British and Irish emigrant craftsmen working in early colonial New South Wales and Tasmania brought with them the Classical Revival style, with its sweeping curves and carved decoration. This elegant furniture, mostly in cedar, and inspired by the re-discovery of ancient civilisations, has many admirers. Bob Fr...

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Vol 42 no 4, Nov 2020
Australian Toys: A Collector’s Story
By Luke Jones   |   November 2020   |   Vol 42 no 4

Many collectors keep up their obsession for decades, but they don’t always begin as children. Luke Jones recounts his passion for collecting Australian toys over nearly 40 years, and how he turned that into a useful and well-illustrated reference book for other collectors.

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Vol 42 no 4, Nov 2020
James and Charlotte Cowlishaw’s ‘Golden Wedding’ Napkin Rings, c 1912
By Dianne Byrne   |   November 2020   |   Vol 42 no 4

What better way to celebrate a golden wedding than with a golden gift that symbolises affection for the recipients, their intimate connection over 50 years and carries their monograms? Dianne Byrne explores the background to a pair of gold napkin rings presented to James and Charlotte Cowlishaw in Brisbane in 1...

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Vol 42 no 4, Nov 2020
Australiana Society Annual Report
By    |   November 2020   |   Vol 42 no 4

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Vol 42 no 4, Nov 2020
President’s Report
By Dr Jim Bertouch   |   November 2020   |   Vol 42 no 4

Thank you for attending the 2020 AGM and it is a pleasure to present, albeit sadly ... for me at least ... my last report. 40th Anniversary Symposium Well I can say that we really started the year with a bang with the highly successful Australiana Symposium at the State Library in October 2019, which was well s...

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Vol 42 no 4, Nov 2020
Treasurer’s Report
By George Lawrence   |   November 2020   |   Vol 42 no 4

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Vol 42 no 4, Nov 2020
2021 Events
By    |   November 2020   |   Vol 42 no 4

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Vol 42 no 4, Nov 2020
Carl Ewald, ‘Gluepot’ Graetz of Graetztown, South Australia
By David Bedford and Richard Phillips   |   November 2020   |   Vol 42 no 4

German settlers in South Australia, notably in the Barossa and to a lesser extent in other parts of Australia, introduced a furniture style based on the rural carpentry traditions of their native lands, rather than the more common styles seen in Australia derived from British cabinetmaking. David Bedford and Ri...

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Vol 42 no 4, Nov 2020
William Paul Dowling: artist, artist-photographer and photographer
By Robert Stevens   |   November 2020   |   Vol 42 no 4

Dublin-born William Paul Dowling (c 1822–1877) worked in London as a draftsman and artist before his Irish Nationalist political activities led to his being transported to Van Diemen’s Land for sedition. Here, the Irish Catholic convict established a reputation as a portrait artist, gradually adapting to th...

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Vol 42 no 3, August 2020
A Cook discovery
By Trevor Hancock   |   August 2020   |   Vol 42 no 3

Exactly 250 years ago, HMB Endeavour commanded by Lt James Cook was the first British ship to sight the east coast of Australia, then known as the Great South Land or Terra Australis Incognita. As one of the most important exploration milestones in Australia’s history, it now seems to be passing largely unnot...

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Vol 42 no 3, August 2020
Angels in the Studio’ in Western Australia: the precursors
By Dorothy Erickson   |   August 2020   |   Vol 42 no 3

Dr Dorothy Erickson begins a new series of articles on Western Australian art, exploring the production and themes adopted by women artists in the 19th century, and putting their work into its social and artistic context.

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Vol 42 no 3, August 2020
Rayner Hoff – sculptor for the 1st AIF and World War I
By John Ramsland   |   August 2020   |   Vol 42 no 3

Historian and biographer John Ramsland surveys the permanent World War I memorials designed by Manx-born sculptor Rayner Hoff (1894–1937), constructed in Dubbo (1925), Adelaide (1927–30) and culminating in his work with architect Bruce Dellit in the Anzac Memorial in Hyde Park, Sydney (1931–34).

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Vol 42 no 3, August 2020
Una Deerbon 1882–1972, Australian potter
By Relton & Peter Leaver   |   August 2020   |   Vol 42 no 3

Una Deerbon was a well-known maker of hand-built pottery, often with applied moulded decoration. When in her late 40s, she began making pottery in 1930. Just three years later she held three solo commercial exhibitions in Sydney and Melbourne, launching her on a successful career as a potter which lasted until ...

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Vol 42 no 3, August 2020
The mystery of the missing James Coutts Crawford watercolours of Glebe, Sydney c 1845
By Robert Hannan & Peter Crawshaw   |   August 2020   |   Vol 42 no 3

The authors are seeking to locate a number of watercolours painted by amateur artist James Coutts Crawford, who lived in Australia in the late 1830s and 1840s, especially his views of early settlement on the Glebe peninsula. Then an Arcadian rural retreat, Glebe is now a densely settled inner Sydney suburb, but...

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Vol 42 no 3, August 2020
Scrimshaw for presentation
By Scott Carlin   |   August 2020   |   Vol 42 no 3

Colin Thomas, Australiana Society Tasmanian Branch Chair, has assembled a scrimshaw collection with the scope and quality of institutional collections in the former whaling centres of New Bedford in Massachusetts1 and Hull in Yorkshire.2 Thomas’s collection encompasses the breadth of scrimshaw from tools to m...

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Vol 42 no 3, August 2020
An early Australian mourning brooch
By Gregory Street   |   August 2020   |   Vol 42 no 3

A gold mourning brooch to commemorate the passing of John Hillas in 1847 at Bannaby (or Bunnaby) near Taralga in southern tablelands of NSW is typical of the early Victorian era and many similar pieces come up for sale today (plates 1-2)1. Black enamel surrounds a central glass-covered locket that most likely w...

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Vol 42 no 3, August 2020
W.J. Williams and his paintings
By Graham J. Williams   |   August 2020   |   Vol 42 no 3

In 2018, Dr Andrew Montana restored William Joseph Williams (1851–1918) as the artist responsible for the late 19th-century painted decoration in South Australia at Ayers House, the Museum of Economic Botany, Rigby’s bookshop, Trew’s South Australian Club Hotel and probably Para Para.1 Now the artist’s ...

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Vol 42 no 2, May 2020
Virtual Show & Tell
By David Bedford   |   May 2020   |   Vol 42 no 2

Communicating with members is a vital activity of any society. We also aim to share knowledge, mainly through our scholarly magazine Australiana. Another channel of communication is through the internet, which has been used for the last few years by the South Australian Study Group, with its monthly “Show and...

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Vol 42 no 2, May 2020
Hunting for Mr. Beauchamp
By John Wade   |   May 2020   |   Vol 42 no 2

Among many contributions to the first "Virtual Show and Tell" was a portrait of a young boy. The owner asked who the artist might be, so the compilers flicked it to me to ask whom we should consult. It turned out to be a fascinating research project, and I want to share the process with readers.

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Vol 42 no 2, May 2020
Collecting: The Convict Artists
By Robert Stevens   |   May 2020   |   Vol 42 no 2

Victorian collector and president of the Victorian branch Robert Stevens distils his passion for the works of convict artists in Australia, many of whom were transported for adapting their skills to forgery. A wide variety of works from public and private collections illustrate the range of their interests.

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Vol 42 no 2, May 2020
Vol 42 no 2, May 2020
Daniel Cooper's 1856 Foundation Stone Box
By Peter Lane   |   May 2020   |   Vol 42 no 2

In 1856, Governor Denison laid the foundation stone for Daniel Cooper's Woollahra House at Point Piper. The stone was designed to hold an engraved copper box containing coins and a medal. This box was re-used for the foundation ceremony of a later Woollahra House in 1883, and unearthed when it was demolished in...

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Vol 42 no 2, May 2020
History is not wasted on the young
By Elizabeth Stevens   |   May 2020   |   Vol 42 no 2

A few years ago, I read an article in The Australian newspaper saying that future generations are at risk for being the generation that forgot history. As a mother who is an antique dealer with a passion for history, I found this a very upsetting concept. In the new world of social media – Instagram, selfies,...

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Vol 42 no 2, May 2020
At Home' at Clairville: a Tasmanian Branch event
By Scott Carlin   |   May 2020   |   Vol 42 no 2

On a beautiful summer’s afternoon, 85 members from Brisbane, Melbourne, Sydney, Hobart and northern Tasmania attended the Tasmanian Branch’s 2020 opening event, an ‘At Home’ at Clairville (plate 1) near Evandale, courtesy of the owners, Michael McWilliams and Robert Henley (plates 2-3). The event on 22 ...

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Vol 42 no 2, May 2020
Robert Dowling, the elusive cabinetmaker of O'Brien's Bridge, Van Diemen's Land
By David Bedford   |   May 2020   |   Vol 42 no 2

David Bedford has researched the life and work of Tasmanian cabinetmaker Richard Dowling (c 1820/1822–1867), little documented till now. He presents new discoveries about Dowling’s life and suggests why Dowling’s story has been so elusive. Evidence has emerged, and examples of his work found, which show t...

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Vol 42 no 1, Feb 2020
The Buck Jumper, an early sculpture by Harold Parker
By Adam Free   |   February 2020   |   Vol 42 no 1

Previously thought lost, this iconic Australian image – a large double-sided painted timber carving of a buck jumper made in 1893/4 by renowned Queensland sculptor Harold Parker – was made as an advertising sign for the Brisbane saddlery of R.E. Jarman. After it re-emerged in 2011 at a Sydney auction, Adam ...

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Vol 42 no 1, Feb 2020
Vol 42 no 1, Feb 2020
Society News
By Robert Stevens, David Bedford   |   February 2020   |   Vol 42 no 1

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Vol 42 no 1, Feb 2020
Social media and the Australiana Society
By Katrina Banyai   |   February 2020   |   Vol 42 no 1

The Australiana Society has launched social media campaigns across several platforms including Facebook, Twitter and Instagram. Our presence on these platforms will diversify the ways we reach members and broaden our audiences. This will generate new interest in the Society for ongoing generations to recruit fo...

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Vol 42 no 1, Feb 2020
The founding years of Harvey School pottery 1916-1922: completing the story
By Glenn R. Cooke   |   February 2020   |   Vol 42 no 1

Australiana is often defined by the combination of local materials, local motifs and local skills to create art that is distinctively and recognisably Australian. The Harvey School of pottery making, which flourished at the Central Technical College in Brisbane from 1916 for more than thirty years is one of the...

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Vol 42 no 1, Feb 2020
Exploring early Queensland art
By Timothy Roberts   |   February 2020   |   Vol 42 no 1

The Harry Gentle Resource Centre, Griffith University has welcomed specialist in Australian art heritage, decorative arts and material culture to 1945 and contributor to Australiana Timothy Roberts as the centre’s 2019 Visiting Fellow. The centre was established by Griffith University in 2016 following a gene...

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Vol 42 no 1, Feb 2020
Charles Rodius, convict artist
By Robert Stevens   |   February 2020   |   Vol 42 no 1

Charles Rodius began his prolific art career in Paris and London. Convicted of thefts in 1829, he was transported to Sydney, where the convict artist produced landscapes, portraits of leading Sydney settlers as well as notable portraits of Aboriginal people, many translated into lithographs. Rodius had a good s...

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Vol 41 no 4, Nov 2019
Australia's first art potters
By Gregory Hill   |   November 2019   |   Vol 41 no 4

Brothers Graham and William Ferry both trained as potters in Yorkshire, emigrated to Victoria and set up their own potteries in Melbourne’s Brunswick in the last two decades of the 19th century. Noted for their sculptural domestic wares and colourful majolica wares, here Greg Hill makes the case for recognisi...

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Vol 41 no 4, Nov 2019
An unrecorded miniature by Ludwig Becker
By Gary Morgan   |   November 2019   |   Vol 41 no 4

Dr Gary Morgan’s research into a recently re-discovered Tasmanian miniature, reported here for the first time, identifies – partly by using new facial recognition technology – that it is a memento of a Tasmanian colonial family, as well as shedding new light on the technique of the artist, Ludwig Becker.

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Vol 41 no 4, Nov 2019
Book Review: Vanessa Finney, Transformations
By Lesley Garrett   |   November 2019   |   Vol 41 no 4

Vanessa Finney, Transformations: Harriet and Helena Scott, colonial Sydney’s finest natural history painters. New South Publishing, 2018, ISBN 9781742235806, 220 pages

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Vol 41 no 4, Nov 2019
The Tattersall's Club cups: Queensland racing history in gold and silver 1884-1888
By Dianne Byrne   |   November 2019   |   Vol 41 no 4

Dianne Byrne shares some of the outcomes of her postgraduate research into 19th-century presentation jewellery and metalwork made in Queensland or for Queenslanders, focusing here on a series of racing trophies made in the 1880s for the Tattersall’s Club Cup run at Eagle Farm racecourse. Two of these were mad...

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Vol 41 no 4, Nov 2019
Forty years of collecting: a love affair with Australiana
By David Bedford & Jennifer Stuerzl   |   November 2019   |   Vol 41 no 4

David Bedford and Jennifer Stuerzl reflect on the pleasures of 40 years of collecting Australiana. Jennifer is a practising artist, painter, print and artist’s book maker and curates international print shows. David was trained as a botanist and became Director of the Royal Tasmanian Botanical Gardens before ...

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Vol 41 no 4, Nov 2019
Captain Molly's table
By Dorothy Erickson   |   November 2019   |   Vol 41 no 4

This is the tale of a table and desk, the first an historic table made by a master craftsman who as an apprentice is reputed to have made one of Queen Victoria’s wedding presents as well as a chair presented to the Queen of Spain. This man made our table in Western Australia from native jarrah for a well-know...

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Vol 41 no 4, Nov 2019
Australiana Society annual report 2018
By Jim Bertouch & George Lawrence   |   November 2019   |   Vol 41 no 4

As you all know we are in our 40th year and will finish our celebrations with a three-day symposium on 18–21 October 2019 at the State Library of NSW. This is going to be a very big and significant event. We have more than 25 confirmed speakers and very many different areas of Australiana will be covered in t...

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Vol 41 no 3, Aug 2019
Australian goldsmiths' marks: the records of the Australian Assay Office
By Jolyon Warwick James   |   August 2019   |   Vol 41 no 3

When you are dealing with precious metals, you want to know that what you have is what it is claimed to be. European countries instituted hallmarking systems to verify this, some of them operating for over 700 years. Silver expert Jolyon Warwick James discusses how Australia had its own hallmarking system, but ...

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Vol 41 no 3, Aug 2019
An exhibition quality display case veneered with an ornate Australian timber
By David Bedford   |   August 2019   |   Vol 41 no 3

This two-height cabinet (plate 1) has a capped, ogee-shaped cornice above, two glazed, veneer-bordered upper doors and two veneered panel doors below flanked by columns (plate 2), standing on a plinth. Its known provenance, as reported to me, is that it was found in Strathfield, Sydney, in the 1970s. Antique de...

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Vol 41 no 3, Aug 2019
The 'Paris Studio' of George de Nemes
By Robert La Nauze   |   August 2019   |   Vol 41 no 3

Gold Rush craftsmen and artists brought their European traditions with them in the mid-19th century, just as George de Nemes (György Nemes) brought his techniques, Hungarian folk art tradition, conceptions of what art should be, fantasies and recollections of totalitarian regimes under the Fascists and Communi...

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Vol 41 no 3, Aug 2019
And to beautify his house": Lyon, Cottier & Co.'s ecclesiastical window glass and decoration during the 1870s'
By Andrew Montana   |   August 2019   |   Vol 41 no 3

Sydney stained glass artists Lyon Cottier & Co. carried out many commissions in public, private and religious buildings in their 50 years of activity from 1873 to 1924. Prominent architects chose their work for Sydney’s GPO, Government House and Parliament House. Religious services were an important and frequ...

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Vol 41 no 3, Aug 2019
Father Kelly's chair
By Jodie Vandepeer   |   August 2019   |   Vol 41 no 3

The November 2018 issue featured the carved furniture of a young woman, Alice Maud Golley (1884–1961) who lived an isolated life with her immediate family on remote Wedge Island in the Spencer Gulf of South Australia. Golley’s furniture is a virtuoso display of skill and grace, yet she was untrained. Among ...

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The Australiana Society acknowledges Australia’s First Nations Peoples – the First Australians – as the Traditional Owners and Custodians of this land and gives respect to the Elders – past and present – and through them to all Australian Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people.