Women, Taste and Professionalism

Local academic Dr Bridie Lonie presents on Groundbreakers - an exhibition that considers the early careers of two of the city’s significant artists, Grace Joel and Frances Hodgkins.

By the 1880s Ōtepoti Dunedin had established itself as a city of learning, inclusive of its settler women, creating a cultured middle class based on their activities. Frances Hodgkins and Grace Joel, nurtured by Ōtepoti’s institutions of art, were early adopters of the position of expatriate artist so prevalent in the following half century. This talk considers how professionalism in the arts can be both encouraged and impeded by the kind of community they emerged from, creating an expanded view of these two important artists. 

Dr Bridie Lonie is an arts educator, arts writer and artist who lectured in art history and art theory. Bridie served as head of school at Dunedin School of Art at Otago Polytechnic.

FREE 5.30pm Thursday 10 April 
in the Groundbreakers exhibition

[Image: Frances Hodgkins Summer c.1912 . Watercolour and charcoal on paper. Collection Dunedin Public Art Gallery]