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William Francis Emery: forgotten artist
by:
Dianne Byrne
THE GREATEST treasure in Queensland's Ipswich Art Gallery is a large panoramic oil painting depicting the town at the beginning of its social and economic development in the 1860s. The work, entitled View of Ipswich from Limestone Hill, was presented to the City of Ipswich in 1986 (plate 1).
For years the painting has been the subject of speculation. It is one of Queensland's most important historical paintings, yet nothing was known about its origin, provenance, or the identity of the artist who created it. Information now has come to light which answers these questions, and adds to our knowledge of the life and career of an almost forgotten colonial artist.
On 28 May 1861, the North Australian, an Ipswich newspaper, recorded the arrival in Queensland of an interesting personality.
We have much pleasure in announcing the arrival from Melbourne of Mr W. Emery, the celebrated animal painter, whose portraits of Alice Hawthorne, Fusilier, and other crack race-horses, were so much admired by the sporting community of Victoria. Mr Emery has already received orders from gentlemen in the neighbourhood for portraits of their favourites, and as his stay will be limited, those desirous of availing themselves of his talents will require to make an early arrangement for that object.1
Emery migrated from England in 1852, working on the Victorian goldfields before embarking on a career as an artist in Melbourne. In 1854, he displayed his Portrait of the Native Bred Horse, The Doctor, at the Melbourne Exhibition, and in 1856 he exhibited a group of horse paintings at Joseph Wilkies music shop in Melbourne. He showed two oils in an exhibition at the Geelong Mechanics Institute in 1857, and works at the Victorian Society of Fine Arts (1857) and the Victorian Industrial Society (1858). In 1860, his View of Quamby Bluff and Ranges, Tasmania and portraits of the racehorses Alice Hawthorne and Flying Buck were exhibited at the Victorian Exhibition of Fine Arts.2
From 1 March 1858 until 31 August 1859, Emery was assistant to the renowned palaeontologist Frederick McCoy, Professor of Natural History at the University of Melbourne.3 In June 1860, he applied to be the official artist on the Burke and Wills expedition, but was rejected in favour of Ludwig Becker. A copy of his application survives in the State Library of Victoria.4
Emery's visit to Queensland coincided with, and may have been prompted by, the colonys first championship horse race, run at Ipswich racecourse on 29 May 1861. The finest horses and riders in Australia assembled for the event and competition was keen for the trophy won by popular Sydney horse Zoe, a golden chestnut mare. Public interest was so great that the Queensland Guardian, a Brisbane newspaper distributed throughout the colony, commissioned a portrait of Zoe.
By announcement elsewhere it will be seen that we purpose (sic) presenting our subscribers on Saturday next with a faithful representation of the winner of the Queensland Championship Race, Zoe, together with her trainer and jockey, Jimmy Ashworth. On the arrival of an artist so eminent with his pencil as Mr Emery, we took advantage of the occasion by suggesting that a drawing of the race should be made by him specially for this journal.5
The day after the race, Emery visited Zoes stable where he produced a 'spirited' pen and ink sketch, which he forwarded to Brisbane engraver Thomas Ham to be turned into the colony's first lithographic print (plate 2).
& as Mr Emery proceeded to Ipswich, Mr Ham commenced erecting the necessary apparatus for carrying out the design & Mr Ham is at the present time engaged on the work, and copies will be issued by us to our subscribers only on Saturday next. We have great pleasure in directing public attention to the fact that Mr Emery purposes (sic) issuing a limited number of copies, beautifully coloured, on drawing paper, for framing, and which will be disposed of by him at the rate of 10s. 6d. per copy. As the price is so reasonable, we trust that the artist will have a large sale, but as only a limited number will be executed, names of persons who wish to subscribe should be sent early to him, the booksellers, or to our office.6
Emery returned to Ipswich bringing copies of the completed print, as well as 'specimens'of paintings which he placed on view at the office of the North Australian newspaper. He advertised in the press offering to execute images of 'favourite Horses, or other stock' and views of 'Scenery or Residences'. Among the resulting commissions was a painting of J Harden Collins' racehorse Huntsman.
The horse is represented standing by his stable door, with the cap and jacket thrown down on the clothing, which introduces colour into the picture, and harmonises the whole work. The landscape is forcibly painted, and brings the horse completely away from the canvas. As a likeness it is considered perfect, and as a work of art it is certainly one of the best we have seen in the colonies. Two water-colour paintings of Van Tromp and Fisherman, by the same artist, are equally successful as likenesses, and we understand have been commended during their exhibition at Brisbane: these, together with the portrait of Huntsman will be on view till next Monday, at the office of this paper.7
Other commissions included views of Bundamba, Maroon and Coochin stations, and the stud of Fassifern pastoralist John Hardie. While staying at Fassifern station, Emery became a witness to events surrounding the death of Boonooroo, an Aboriginal servant on the property.8
In November 1861, Emery displayed some of his works in Ipswich, and prepared to proceed up the Country on another painting tour. He exhibited the results at J W Buxtons bookshop in Brisbane in May 1862. The Brisbane Courier singled out views of The Peak Mountain, of Mt Flinders Station [sic], and the Dugandan Stations, in the Fassifern district, south of Ipswich. The Courier praised Emerys depiction of Dugandan.
The view is taken from the hill at the back of the station, looking down upon the house and garden & from the part whence the view is taken, the hill commands all the surrounding country; that selected for the picture has in the distance the Pulpit Rock at Moogra (adjoining Fassifern) on the right, Mount Maroon, rising about the centre of the picture; with Mount Barney and other ranges, obscuring Mount Lindsay, to the left. The painting has the warm glow of the afternoon sun, and the sheep are advanced to their camping place on the hill.9
The work which was judged the most striking, however, was a large view of Ipswich looking from the vantage point of Limestone Ridge.
The artist has here chosen, perhaps, the most comprehensive view of the town, as in the painting may be observed nearly the whole of the principal buildingsthe range being from Mr Panton's house on the right, to the hospital on the left. In the foreground some of the 'lords of the soil' are introduced, probably with the view of heightening the colour of the picture; some goats are browsing on the ridge under the fig-trees, which, together with the light and shadow of the sky, combine most artistically to counteract the effect of the parallel lines of the town & There can be no doubt that the 'Westend' has received full justice at the hands of Mr Emery.10
This 'comprehensive view of the town', executed in oil colours, with its 'lords of the soil' (Aborigines) and goats ... browsing on the ridge', is the wonderful painting now in the Ipswich Art Gallery. The Brisbane Courier identifies the painting's first owner as Charles Lamonnerie dit Fattorini, a prominent Ipswich stock and station agent and auctioneer. Fattorini was a colourful figure who settled in the town in 1860, and served as a Commissioner of the Peace, and Honorary Secretary of the North Australian Jockey Club.11
The painting is remarkably detailed in its depiction of a young but rapidly growing Ipswich, just nineteen years after it was opened to free settlement. At far right, the Bremer River winds along the town's outskirts, and in the right foreground is Claremont, the Georgian-style residence built c. 1858 for John Panton, a local cotton pioneer. At the centre is Brisbane Street, the location of two of Ipswichs landmark buildings:
St Paul's Anglican Church, opened in 1859, and the Mechanics School of Arts, opened in 1861. The Mechanics School of Arts still stands, transformed into the Ipswich Art Gallerythe present home of the Emery painting.
Emerys painting provides an insight into a world at odds with Ipswichs progressiveness. The lords of the soil depicted in the painting were local Aborigines, who at the time were resented in the town because of their continued presence.12 The Ipswich depicted by Emery is a microcosm of the old and the new, the past and the present, the wanted and the unwanted. His work depicts both the untouched landscape surrounding the town and the improved man-made environment.
Emery's View of Ipswich from Limestone Hill is indeed a grand picture, and one of the most important Queensland colonial paintings. It is tantalising to consider whether his other topographic works painted in south-east Queensland at the same time, all yet to be re-discovered, might be of equal grandeur.
NOTES
1 North Australian, Ipswich and General Advertiser, 28 May 1861.
2 Dr Joan Kerr first drew attention to W F Emery in her Dictionary of Australian Artists (Melbourne: Oxford University Press, 1992)
p 245. I am indebted to Jason Benjamin of the University of Melbourne Archives, and
Dr Kevin Lambkin for generous advice.
3 Emery was paid 150 pounds a year for this work. McCoy was a towering presence who was appointed Director of the Museum of Natural and Applied Sciences at the University of Melbourne in 1857, instrumental in opening the National Museum in the university grounds in 1864.
4 MS 13071. Ludwig Becker died on the expedition from the effects of dysentery and scurvy.
5 Queensland Guardian, 5 June 1861.
6 Ibid.
7 North Australian, Ipswich and General Advertiser, 19 July 1861.
8 Brisbane Courier, 14 September 1861.
9 Brisbane Courier, 20 May 1862.
10 Brisbane Courier, 20 May 1862. The Queensland Guardian, 20 May 1862 also reviewed Emery's work: We have been favoured by Mr Emery, the artist, with the inspection of a view of Ipswich, executed in oil colours, and two water-colour sketches of Brisbane scenery. Mr Emery's forte is animal painting, and he evidently does not attain the same degree of excellence in his landscapes; still the views which we have had the pleasure of seeing, evince considerable merit, and will be valued by those who wish to possess a memento of the more striking points of the scenery of Brisbane and Ipswich.'
11 Charles Fattorini (b. 1836) owned the Ipswich premises where Emery exhibited some of his paintings in November 1861. His father Dr Jean Baptiste Charles Lamonnerie dit Fattorini (17871853) had been Government Medical Officer at Port Macquarie and according to legend, was the illegitimate son of Napoleon.
12 Ipswich Herald and General Advertiser,
30 July 1861. |
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