Edith Collier
{{Short description|New Zealand artist (1885–1964)}}
{{Use New Zealand English|date=October 2022}}
{{Use dmy dates|date=December 2024}}
{{Infobox artist
| name = Edith Marion Collier
| image =Edith Marion Collier with cello.jpg
| image_size =
| alt =
| caption =
| birth_date= {{Birth date|1885|03|28|df=y}}
| birth_place = Wanganui
|death_date= {{Death date and age|1964|12|12|1885|03|28|df=y}}
|nationality = New Zealander
}}
Edith Marion Collier (28 March 1885 – 12 December 1964) was an early modern painter from New Zealand.
Biography
Brought up and educated in Whanganui, Collier received a thorough although conservative art education studying at the Technical School in Whanganui.{{DNZB|title=Edith Marion Collier|first= Joanne|last= Drayton|id=4c25|access-date=23 April 2017}}{{CiteQ|Q118224886}}
At the age of 27 Collier 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.{{Cite journal |date=1981 |title=Edith Collier in Retrospect November 14 – December 13 |url=https://christchurchartgallery.org.nz/media/uploads/2010_07/Bulletin_018.pdf |journal=Bulletin |volume=18 |pages=4}}{{CiteQ|Q118224886}} Through her works, Collier explored the media of oil paint, watercolour, printmaking and pencil drawing. After spending almost a decade receiving professional artistic training, Collier 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.Film, A light Among Shadows{{Cite web |url=http://www.cup.canterbury.ac.nz/catalogue/edith_collier.shtml |title=Edith Collier: Her life and work 1885–1964 – Catalogue – Canterbury University Press – University of Canterbury – New Zealand |access-date=14 February 2009 |archive-date=14 October 2008 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20081014044853/http://www.cup.canterbury.ac.nz/catalogue/edith_collier.shtml |url-status=dead }}{{Cite book| last = Drayton | first = Joanne | title = Edith Collier: Her Life and Work 1885–1964 | publisher = Canterbury University Press | year = 1999 | location = New Zealand | isbn = 978-0-908812-90-5 }}Anne Kirker, New Zealand Women Artists, Reed Methuen, 1986 {{ISBN|0-474-00181-4}}
File:Edith Collier - Little schoolboy of Bonmahon - Google Art Project.jpg]]
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.Joanne Drayton (1997). [https://www.jstor.org/stable/1358674 Edith Collier: An Early New Zealand Modernist]. Woman's Art Journal 18 (1): 9–13. {{subscription required}}
A street is named after her in the suburb of St Johns Hill, Whanganui. The Edith Collier Trust works to raise awareness of Collier's life work and legacy. The Trust was incorporated under the Charitable Trusts Act 1957 on 28 November 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 catalogue of the archived works can be viewed in the Sarjeant Gallery's online collection.{{Cite web |title=Edith Collier |url=https://collection.sarjeant.org.nz/persons/9113/edith-collier |access-date=8 September 2024 |website=Te Whare o Rehua Sarjeant Gallery}}{{Cite web |title=Village by the Sea |url=https://collection.sarjeant.org.nz/objects?query=highlight:%221%22&sort=highlight_1&searchType=highlight |access-date=27 March 2020 |website=Sarjeant Gallery Whanganui |language=en |archive-date=21 January 2019 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190121231733/https://collection.sarjeant.org.nz/objects?query=highlight%3A%221%22&sort=highlight_1&searchType=highlight |url-status=dead }} This collection also includes several photographs of Collier by Annie Elizabeth Davis, that were taken prior to Collier leaving to study in the UK.{{Cite web |last=Mitchell |first=Lissa |title=Annie Davis |url=https://collection.sarjeant.org.nz/persons/12812/annie-davis |access-date=25 October 2024 |website=Te Whare o Rehua Sarjeant Gallery |language=en}}
References
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External links
- [https://www.nzonscreen.com/title/edith-collier-a-light-among-shadows-2007 Documentary on Edith Collier]
{{Authority control}}
{{The Group NZ|state=collapsed}}
{{DEFAULTSORT:Collier, Edith}}
Category:20th-century New Zealand painters
Category:20th-century New Zealand women artists
Category:Alumni of St John's Wood Art School
Category:People educated at Whanganui Girls' College