Frances Hodgkins

Aotearoa New Zealand, b.1869, d.1947

Still Life with Red Jar

  • c. 1933
  • Watercolour
  • Purchased with assistance from the National Art Collections Fund, London, 1994
  • 465 x 420mm
  • 94/04

“You say in yr last [letter] that I will not tag on to Colonial life after staying away so long – you surely don’t expect & want me to settle down into a Maiden Aunt do you & throw up career & ambition & lose the precious ground I have gained – you are much too dear and unselfish for that I am sure. I am coming out merely to see you & Sis & the children, to be with you for a while & then to return to my work like any man of business. To make you happy I must be happy myself. I want to see you badly & feel I must come soon at no matter what sacrifice. But do realise Mother that it’s on this side of the world that my work and future career lie. I grieve sometimes that you do not understand this more.” —Frances Hodgkins, excerpt from a letter to her mother, Rachel Hodgkins, 1911

(Perilous: Unheard Stories from the Collection, 6 August 2022- )

Exhibition History