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Edith Collier

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Edith Marion Collier
Born(1885-03-28)28 March 1885
Wanganui
Died12 December 1964(1964-12-12) (aged 79)
NationalityNew Zealander

Edith Marion Collier (28 March 1885 – 12 December 1964) was an early modern painter from New Zealand. Brought up and educated in Whanganui, Edith received a thorough although conservative art education studying at the Technical School in Whanganui.[1][2] At the age of 27 Edith then travelled to Britain in 1913 and studied at the St John's Wood School of Art in London and toured throughout the United Kingdom, executing works in St. Ives, Cornwall; Glasgow Scotland; Bonmahn, Southern Ireland among others.[3][4] Through her works, Edith explored the media of oil paint, watercolour, printmaking and pencil drawing. After spending almost a decade receiving professional artistic training, Edith returned to provincial Whanganui where her works were met with criticism as a result of her assimilation into the radical innovations of British modernism and New Zealand's dissimilar art scene at the time. For this reason, her work is largely unknown at home and overseas.[5][6][7][8]

Little schoolboy of Bonmahon, circa 1915, oil on canvas, 496 × 395 mm, Te Papa

Collier returned to New Zealand in 1922 as an experienced artist with innovative ideas, but as a spinster in provincial Whanganui received harsh treatment, including what Joanne Drayton describes as savage, critical assessment and negative response from her own community. In a well-known incident her father burned many of her best paintings, including her nude studies.[9]

A street is named after her in the suburb of St Johns Hill, Whanganui. The Edith Collier Trust works to raise awareness of Edith's life work and legacy. The Trust was incorporated under the Charitable Trusts Act 1957 on 28/11/1994. The Trust and the Sarjeant Gallery Te Whare o Rehua, in Whanganui, have a collaborative partnership where the Sarjeant Gallery stores and cares for the majority of Collier's surviving works, books and ephemera which belong to the Trust. The cataloguing of the archived works can be viewed in the Sarjeant Gallery's online collection.[10]

References

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Wikimedia Commons has media related to Edith Collier.
  1. ^ Drayton, Joanne. "Edith Marion Collier". Dictionary of New Zealand Biography. Ministry for Culture and Heritage. Retrieved 23 April 2017.
  2. ^ Peter Vangioni (2023). Ink on Paper: Aotearoa New Zealand Printmakers of the Modern Era. Christchurch: Christchurch Art Gallery. ISBN 978-1-87-737577-4. OCLC 1370607329. OL 51712170M. Wikidata Q118224886.
  3. ^ "Edith Collier in Retrospect November 14 – December 13" (PDF). Bulletin. 18: 4. 1981.
  4. ^ Peter Vangioni (2023). Ink on Paper: Aotearoa New Zealand Printmakers of the Modern Era. Christchurch: Christchurch Art Gallery. ISBN 978-1-87-737577-4. OCLC 1370607329. OL 51712170M. Wikidata Q118224886.
  5. ^ Film, A light Among Shadows
  6. ^ "Edith Collier: Her life and work 1885-1964 - Catalogue - Canterbury University Press - University of Canterbury - New Zealand". Archived from the original on 14 October 2008. Retrieved 14 February 2009.
  7. ^ Drayton, Joanne (1999). Edith Collier: Her Life and Work 1885–1964. New Zealand: Canterbury University Press. ISBN 978-0-908812-90-5.
  8. ^ Anne Kirker, New Zealand Women Artists, Reed Methuen, 1986 ISBN 0-474-00181-4
  9. ^ Joanne Drayton (1997). Edith Collier: An Early New Zealand Modernist. Woman's Art Journal 18 (1): 9–13. (subscription required)
  10. ^ "Village by the Sea". Sarjeant Gallery Whanganui. Archived from the original on 21 January 2019. Retrieved 27 March 2020.
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