B.

Happy Birthday Frances Hodgkins

Behind the scenes

Our final birthday for April is Frances Hodgkins (1869-1947)

Frances Hodgkins Spanish Still Life And Landscape. Oil on wood panel. Collection of Christchurch art Gallery te Puna o Waiwhetū, purchased 1979

Frances Hodgkins Spanish Still Life And Landscape. Oil on wood panel. Collection of Christchurch art Gallery te Puna o Waiwhetū, purchased 1979

This particular painting was purchased for the Gallery in 1979 from Anthony Julian Huxley (1920-1992), a member of the eminent Huxley family. His father was Julian Huxley, scientist and first director of UNESCO, and his uncle was Aldous the author. Anthony Julian was himself a botanist, writer and editor whose magnum opus was the four-volume New Royal Horticultural Society Dictionary of Gardening.

It seems entirely apt that he of all people should own a flowery still life by Frances Hodgkins.