Charles Worsley
British / Aotearoa New Zealand, b.1863, d.1923
Mount Sefton
- c. 1905
- Watercolour
- Presented by the Canterbury Society of Arts, 1932
- 996 x 1105mm
- 70/52
- View on google maps
Location: Sir Robertson and Lady Stewart Gallery
Tags: clouds, fog, landscapes (representations), mountains, natural landscapes, roads, snow (precipitation)
The Aoraki region was among Charles Worsley’s favourite places to paint. This is his largest watercolour from the area and presents an atmospheric view of Kakīroa Mount Sefton from near the Aoraki Mount Cook Hermitage hotel. The hotel was described in a 1906 exhibition review as a place where “within a few yards of a glorious log fire one may sit and watch the avalanches crashing down the rock faces and cliffs”. This work remained unsold when it was exhibited in London and Paris, but its value in promoting tourism in Aotearoa New Zealand was recognised, and it was loaned to the Government Tourist Department’s Ōtautahi Christchurch office until 1917.
He Kapuka Oneone – A Handful of Soil (from August 2024)
Exhibition History
Mount Sefton lies in the Mount Cook region of the Southern Alps, and Foliage Hill is a short walk from the Mount Cook village where Charles Worsley would have stayed while visiting the region in 1902. The immense scale of this painting shows Worsley’s technical virtuosity with his favourite medium of watercolour. His success was marked in 1923 when Queen Mary bought one of his watercolours for the Royal Collection. Born in Devon, Worsley studied art in London, Antwerp and Paris. He settled in London and began exhibiting at the Royal Institute for British Artists in 1887, then at the Royal Academy in 1889. His wife Beatrice suffered from asthma so in 1896 they left England, arriving in New Zealand in 1898. They lived in a number of places, including Christchurch, before returning to Britain in 1920.