Norah Gurdon

Norah Gurdon (April 1882 - 27 June 1974) was an Australian artist.

Norah Gurdon
BornApril 1882
Norfolk, England
Died27 June 1974
Kalorama, Victoria, Australia
EducationNational Gallery Art School
Known forPainting, Portraiture, Weaving
MovementImpressionism, Post-Impressionism, Heidelberg School
AwardsBritish Victory Medal for services during the war

Early life

Norah Gurdon was born in April 1882 in Norfolk, England, to Dr. Edwin John Gurdon and Ellen Ann Randall.[1] She was the second of four surviving children, and her family emigrated to Ballarat, Victoria in 1886,[1] travelling on board ship the Carlisle Castle.[2] They eventually settled in Brighton where her father had a doctor's surgery at their home.[1] Gurdon showed early artistic talent while attending Brighton High School for Girls.[1]

Career

Gurdon attended the National Gallery School from 1901 to 1908, being taught by noted artists Frederick McCubbin and Bernard Hall.[1] While there she studied with fellow artists Jessie Traill, Dora Wilson, Constance Jenkins, and Janet Cumbrae Stewart, who were to become her lifelong friends.[1][2] An accomplished landscape and still-life painter,[2] Gurdon exhibited her works with the Victorian Artists Society while still a student.[1] She established her artistic prowess early on by winning the major category for oil painting in the 1909 City of Prahran's Art Exhibition Prize.[1] By the following year she had rented a studio in Collins Street along with friends Stewart and Traill. As well as being a prominent figure in the Melbourne Society of Painters and Sculptors, Gurdon went on to exhibit with fellow National Gallery School alumni in 1913 as part of Twelve Melbourne Painters. The group included Ruth Sutherland, Charles Wheeler, Dora Wilson, May Roxburgh, Percy Leason, Louis McCubbin, Penleigh Boyd, H.B. Harrison, and Frank Cozier.[1]

World War I

Intending to continue her artistic training overseas, in 1914 Gurdon travelled to England with her sister Winifred.[3] Gurdon along with friend Jessie Traill was stuck in Europe[1] due to the outbreak of war ten weeks after arriving.[2] She signed up as a British Red Cross volunteer nurse in a French military hospital at Le Croisic, serving for three and a half years[4] and was awarded a British Victory medal for her services.[2] Much of her painting during this time was landscapes from travels to England and Scotland prior to war breaking out,[4] and when armistice was reached in 1920 she stayed on to paint through Scotland, Suffolk, and Cornwall.[1] This was hardly her only venture overseas however, as she returned in 1927,[1] meeting fellow artists Pegg Clarke and Dora Wilson in Rome,[5] and narrowly avoiding World War II on her 1938 travels to Norway and Sweden.[6]

Kalorama

Unlike many other female artists of the time, Norah Gurdon was unmarried and financially independent.[3] She purchased land in 1922 with plans to build her dream house in the Dandenong Ranges at Kalorama.[1] When the house was finished she lived there with her sister Winifred and had many fellow artists as guests, with former students and teachers joining her for plen air landscape painting.[1] While Gurdon painted in an impressionist style similar to her contemporaries, she favoured muted blue and grey tones to capture the hills of the Dandenongs.[2] She also enjoyed handicrafts, spending her spare time at tapestry looms designing and producing her own floor rugs and mats.[6]

  • Selected photographs
  • Norah Gurdon and Janet Cumbrae Stewart, Private collection
  • Pegg Clarke, Norah Gurdon, and Dora Wilson (and Brompton) at Kalorama, Private collection
  • Moving into Kalorama, Private collection
  • Finished house at Kalorama, Private collection
  • Norah and Terry, Private collection

Exhibitions

Gurdon was a regular and successful exhibitor of work, exhibiting with the Victorian Artists Society, Melbourne Society of Women Painters and Sculptors, and the Australian Art Association.[2] In the 1920s she held many solo exhibitions at the Athenaeum Gallery, and later at the Women's Industrial Arts Society in Sydney, and the Royal Queensland Art Society in Brisbane.[2] She held an exhibition in 1937 at the Fine Arts Gallery in aid of the construction of St George's Hospital in Kew.[3][7]

Exhibition catalogue of Twelve Melbourne Painters (page 2), State Library of New South Wales
  • The Waddy Club, Guildhall, 1909[8]
  • Victorian Artists Society, Athenaeum Gallery, 1910[9]
  • City of Prahran Art Exhibition (First Prize in Oils), 1911[10]
  • Group exhibition (with Dora Wilson and Ruth Sutherland), Tuckett and Styles' Art Gallery, 1912[11]
  • Victorian Artists Society annual exhibition, Eastern Hill, 1912[12]
  • Twelve Melbourne Painters, Athenaeum Gallery, 1913[13]
  • Victorian Artists Society annual exhibition, Eastern Hill, 1913[14]
  • Private viewing in London, 1915[15]
  • Solo exhibition, Athenaeum Gallery, 1920[16]
  • Women Painters' Club, Sydney, 1920[17]
  • Solo exhibition, Queensland Art Society's Gallery, 1921[18]
  • Victorian Artists Society autumn exhibition, Albert St Galleries, 1921[19]
  • Victorian Artists Society spring exhibition, Albert St Galleries, 1921[20]
  • Victorian Artists Society spring exhibition, Albert St Galleries, 1922[21]
  • Solo exhibition, Athenaeum Gallery, 1923[22]
  • Melbourne Society of Women Painters and Sculptors annual exhibition, 1923[23]
  • Royal Academy Exhibition of Australian Art, London, 1923[24]
  • Melbourne Society of Women Painters and Sculptors annual exhibition, 1924[25]
  • Solo exhibition, Athenaeum Gallery, 1925[26]
  • Melbourne Society of Women Painters and Sculptors annual exhibition, 1926[27]
  • Solo exhibition, Athenaeum Gallery, 1927[28]
  • Melbourne Society of Women Painters and Sculptors annual exhibition, 1928[29]
  • Solo exhibition, New Gallery, 1929[30]
  • Victorian Artists Society spring exhibition, Albert St Galleries, 1929[31]

Further reading

Her Own Path: Norah Gurdon, Bayside City Council

Norah Gurdon [Australian art and artists file], State Library Victoria

References
  1. "Her Own Path: Norah Gurdon | Bayside City Council". www.bayside.vic.gov.au. Retrieved 18 October 2021.
  2. Angeloro, David James (2019). "Dictionary of Australian Artists" (PDF). Davidson Auctions. Retrieved 19 October 2021.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: url-status (link)
  3. Hanna, Bronwyn (2017). "Ridgewalk: a History of Culture, Artists, and Creativity In The Dandenong Ranges" (PDF). Yarra Ranges Council. Retrieved 19 October 2021.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: url-status (link)
  4. "ART APPLIED ON WAR SERVICE - MELBOURNE GIRL'S SUCCESS - The Herald (Melbourne, Vic. : 1861 - 1954) - 17 May 1920". Trove. Retrieved 19 October 2021.
  5. "The Home: an Australian quarterly". Trove. 1 September 1928. Retrieved 19 October 2021.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: url-status (link)
  6. "What Women are Doing". Australian Women's Weekly. 26 August 1939. Retrieved 19 October 2021.
  7. "COMING EVENTS". Argus. 6 April 1937. Retrieved 19 October 2021.
  8. "THE WADDY CLUB EXHIBITION". Argus. 15 June 1909. Retrieved 19 October 2021.
  9. "SOME OF THE WORK AT THE VICTORIAN ARTIST' SOCIETY IN THE ATHENENAE[?]". Weekly Times. 29 October 1910. Retrieved 19 October 2021.
  10. "Prahran PAINTING COMPETITION AND EXHIBITION". Malvern Standard. 9 September 1911. Retrieved 19 October 2021.
  11. "GENERAL NEWS". Argus. 3 May 1912. Retrieved 19 October 2021.
  12. "THE VICTORIAN ARTISTS' ANNUAL SHOW". Punch. 18 July 1912. Retrieved 19 October 2021.
  13. "EXHIBITION OF PICTURES". Age. 3 September 1913. Retrieved 19 October 2021.
  14. "VICTORIAN ARTISTS' SOCIETY". Age. 29 September 1913. Retrieved 19 October 2021.
  15. "ARTIST WORK ON VIEW - The Herald (Melbourne, Vic. : 1861 - 1954) - 29 Jul 1915". Trove. Retrieved 19 October 2021.
  16. "MISS GURDON'S PAINTINGS. - The Argus (Melbourne, Vic. : 1848 - 1957) - 18 May 1920". Trove. Retrieved 19 October 2021.
  17. "SOCIETY DOINGS IN SYDNEY". Australasian. 28 August 1920. Retrieved 19 October 2021.
  18. "Advertising". Telegraph. 9 April 1921. Retrieved 19 October 2021.
  19. "ART IN VICTORIA". Herald. 23 May 1921. Retrieved 19 October 2021.
  20. "EXHIBITION OF PAINTINGS". Argus. 5 September 1921. Retrieved 19 October 2021.
  21. "SOCIAL NOTES". Australasian. 28 October 1922. Retrieved 19 October 2021.
  22. "ROBERTSON & MULLEN'S STAFF SOCIAL". Table Talk. 5 April 1923. Retrieved 19 October 2021.
  23. "WOMEN PAINTERS. - Marked Advance Shown ANNUAL EXHIBITION - The Sun (Sydney, NSW : 1910 - 1954) - 5 May 1923". Trove. Retrieved 19 October 2021.
  24. "AUSTRALIAN ART". Age. 26 May 1923. Retrieved 19 October 2021.
  25. "WOMEN PAINTERS' EXHIBITION". Sydney Morning Herald. 10 May 1924. Retrieved 19 October 2021.
  26. "MISS N. GURDON'S ART". Herald. 19 May 1925. Retrieved 19 October 2021.
  27. "WOMEN'S ART". Daily Telegraph. 29 April 1926. Retrieved 19 October 2021.
  28. "NEWS OF THE DAY". Age. 22 April 1927. Retrieved 19 October 2021.
  29. "WOMAN'S INTERESTS". Age. 4 October 1928. Retrieved 20 October 2021.
  30. "SOCIAL NOTES". Australasian. 6 April 1929. Retrieved 20 October 2021.
  31. "THE ARTISTS' SOCIETY". Age. 19 October 1929. Retrieved 20 October 2021.
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