B.

Eileen Mayo: Painter/Designer is a retrospective exhibition which assesses the career of painter and designer Eileen Mayo. The exhibition, which has been curated and toured by the National Library of New Zealand, illustrates Mayo's extraordinary talent across a wide range of media and shows the directions in which her work has developed throughout a long working life.

Mayo, who came to New Zealand in 1962, is an artist of considerable international standing. Her career spans some 60 years, from the 1920s to the 1980s and three countries: England, Australia and New Zealand. Her initial training was at the Slade School in London in the early 1920s , and her tenacity and desire for new skills made her expand this training into a number of fields including lithography, calligraphy, modelling and engraving. Her work encompasses designs for murals, posters, coins, postage stamps, tapestries and books – many of which she wrote and illustrated – as well as paintings, prints of various kinds and drawings.

The work of Eileen Mayo breaks down the barriers that divide the fine and applied arts, for it belongs in both categories. Her work is represented in many collections, public and private, including a number of New Zealand art galleries, the Tate Gallery, and the Victorian and Albert museum in London. Eileen Mayo was a lecturer at the School of Fine Arts at the University of Canterbury between 1967 and 1872.

('Eileen Mayo: Painter/Designer', Bulletin, No.86, August/September/October 1993, p.1)