Nora Heysen AMThe Order of Australia is an order of chivalry established on 14 February 1975 by Elizabeth II, Queen of Australia, "for the purpose of according recognition to Australian citizens and other persons for achievement or for meritorious service"...
(11 January 1911 - 30 December 2003) was an
AustraliaAustralia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...
n artist, the first woman to win the prestigious
Archibald PrizeThe Archibald Prize is regarded as the most important portraiture prize in Australia. It was first awarded in 1921 after a bequest from J. F. Archibald, the editor of The Bulletin who died in 1919...
for portraiture and the first Australian woman appointed as an official
war artistA war artist depicts some aspect of war through art; this might be a pictorial record or it might commemorate how "war shapes lives." War artists have explored a visual and sensory dimension of war which is often absent in written histories or other accounts of warfare.- Definition and context:A...
.
Biography
Heysen was born in Hahndorf, the fourth child of
South AustraliaSouth Australia is a state of Australia in the southern central part of the country. It covers some of the most arid parts of the continent; with a total land area of , it is the fourth largest of Australia's six states and two territories.South Australia shares borders with all of the mainland...
n landscape painter Sir
Hans HeysenSir Hans Heysen, OBE was a well-known German Australian artist. He was particularly recognized for his watercolours of the Australian bush. He won the Wynne Prize for landscape painting a record nine times.-Biography:...
. She was raised at
The Cedars in Hahndorf in the Adelaide Hills. She studied art from 1926 to 1930, at the School of Fine Arts in Adelaide, under F. Millward Grey and sold paintings to the
Art Gallery of New South WalesThe Art Gallery of New South Wales , located in The Domain in Sydney, New South Wales, Australia, was established in 1897 and is the most important public gallery in Sydney and the fourth largest in Australia...
and the
Art Gallery of South AustraliaThe Art Gallery of South Australia , located on the cultural boulevard of North Terrace in Adelaide, is the premier visual arts museum in the Australian state of South Australia. It has a collection of over 35,000 works of art, making it, after the National Gallery of Victoria, the largest state...
in 1930. From 1930 to 1933, she continued to study two days a week at the School, and worked in her own studio the rest of the time. In 1931 she visited Sydney with her parents, and spent two weeks studying at the Julian Ashton School.
Her first solo exhibition was held in
SydneySydney is the most populous city in Australia and the state capital of New South Wales. Sydney is located on Australia's south-east coast of the Tasman Sea. As of June 2010, the greater metropolitan area had an approximate population of 4.6 million people...
in 1933. In 1934 she travelled to London with her family, remaining in Europe, after they returned home, until 1937 studying and painting. When she returned to Australia she returned briefly to Adelaide and then moved to Sydney.
In 1938 she entered two portraits in the Archibald Prize. Her portrait of Madame Elink Schuurman was awarded the prize and she became the first woman to win the Archibald. There was a controversy involving criticism of her win by painter
Max MeldrumDuncan Max Meldrum was a Scottish born Australian painter. He is known as the founder of Australian Tonalism, a representational style of painting, as well as his portrait work, for which he won the Archibald Prize in 1939 and 1940.-Early Life and Training:Meldrum was born in Edinburgh, Scotland,...
. On 12 October 1943 she became the first women to be appointed as an Australian war artist. "I was commissioned to depict the women’s war effort. There was that restriction on what I did. So I was lent around to all the services, the air force, the navy and the army, to depict the women working at everything they did during the war". During her service Heysen completed over 170 works of art and was discharged from service in 1946 in
New GuineaNew Guinea is the world's second largest island, after Greenland, covering a land area of 786,000 km2. Located in the southwest Pacific Ocean, it lies geographically to the east of the Malay Archipelago, with which it is sometimes included as part of a greater Indo-Australian Archipelago...
.
While in New Guinea Nora met Dr Robert Black, whom she would marry in 1953. Following her discharge from war service she went to London, returning to Sydney in 1948. She continued to paint, exhibit and travel with her husband. In 1993 she was awarded the
Australia CouncilThe Australia Council, informally known as the Australia Council for the Arts, is the official arts council or arts funding body of the Government of Australia.-Function:...
’s Award for Achievement in the Arts and on 26 January 1998 she was appointed a Member of the Order of Australia for her service to art.
Her works are held in the collections of the
National Gallery of AustraliaThe National Gallery of Australia is the national art gallery of Australia, holding more than 120,000 works of art. It was established in 1967 by the Australian government as a national public art gallery.- Establishment :...
, the
Australian War MemorialThe Australian War Memorial is Australia's national memorial to the members of all its armed forces and supporting organisations who have died or participated in the wars of the Commonwealth of Australia...
, the
National Library of AustraliaThe National Library of Australia is the largest reference library of Australia, responsible under the terms of the National Library Act for "maintaining and developing a national collection of library material, including a comprehensive collection of library material relating to Australia and the...
, the
National Portrait GalleryThe National Portrait Gallery of Australia is a collection of portraits of prominent Australians that are important in their field of endeavour or whose life sets them apart as an individual of long-term public interest...
and several state galleries.
Awards
- 1933: Melrose Prize for Portraiture
- 1938: Archibald Prize
- 1993: Australia Council
The Australia Council, informally known as the Australia Council for the Arts, is the official arts council or arts funding body of the Government of Australia.-Function:...
Award for Achievement in the Arts
- 1998: Order of Australia (AM)
The Order of Australia is an order of chivalry established on 14 February 1975 by Elizabeth II, Queen of Australia, "for the purpose of according recognition to Australian citizens and other persons for achievement or for meritorious service"...
External links
- http://www.balgal.com/?id=heysennoraMotherhood 1941 - Ballarat Fine Art Gallery
Art Gallery of Ballarat is the oldest and largest regional art gallery in Australia. Established in 1884 as the Ballarat Fine Art Gallery by the citizens of Ballarat both the building and part of its collection is listed on the Victorian Heritage Registerand by the National Trust of Victoria.The...
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