Collection
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About
Vera Blackburn took private art classes with Thea Proctor in 1931, who taught her how to make linocuts. She also studied for five years at the Adelaide Perry Art School in Sydney before leaving for England with her father in 1937. While in the UK she studied at the Westminster School of Art under Meninsky and Gertler among others, and was friends with a number of expatriate artists including Jean Bellette, Eric Wilson, John Passmore and William Dobell. She remained in England after marrying in London in 1939, when she ceased to make art.
"This linocut with its undulating line of swans was inspired by a passage in Tchaikovsky's music for 'Swan Lake' which the artist had recently seen. She had also been reading an Irish legend about the Children of Lir who were transformed into swans by an enchantment."
Roger Butler, 1979
© Australian Art Department, Art Gallery of New South Wales, 2006
Details
Date
1935
Materials used
linocut, printed in black ink on thin ivory laid tissue
Edition
Unknown, approximately 10
Dimensions
30.2 x 24.4 cm blockmark; 35.2 x 29.9 cm sheet (irreg.)
Signature & date
Signed within block to print lower c., incised "VBB".
Signed and dated l.r., pencil "Vera Blackburn July 1935".
Credit
Purchased with funds provided by the Australian Prints, Drawings and Watercolours Benefactors Fund 2006
Location
Not on display
Accession number
307.2006
Shown in 2 exhibitions
Exhibition history
Australian Collection Focus: Colour, Rhythm, Design - wood & lino cuts of the 20s & 30s, Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney, 12 Mar 2010–11 Jul 2010
Modern impressions; Australian prints from the collection, Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney, 02 Sep 2016–Jan 2017
Referenced in 4 publications
Bibliography
Helen Campbell, Colour, rhythm, design: wood & lino cuts of the 20s & 30s, 'Introduction', pg. 2, Sydney, 2010, 20 (colour illus.).
Josef Lebovic, Masterpieces of Australian printmaking, Sydney, 1987, 14, 15 (illus.). cat.no. 13
Vera Blackburn, Victoria, 1979, (illus.). plate no. 12; not paginated
Unknown, Australian woodcuts and linocuts of the 1920s and 1930s, South Melbourne, 1976, 13, 64 (illus.). Collection of National Trust of Australia