Work Of Sydney Artist Recalls Victorian Era

Press, Volume XC, Issue 27395, 7 July 1954, Page 2

Work Of Sydney Artist Recalls Victorian Era

NEWS FOR WOMEN

Sydney has a 94-year-old artist who has never had a lesson and never given a show, but whose work is valued not only for its delicate touchbut also as an historical record of the Sydney of the 1860’s and 1870’s. For although she paints many contemporary subjects Miss E. M. Whiting, of Mosman, recalls continuously in her work the scenes of her childhood.

Painting is the hobby she took up as a child. She needed to while away the time as she and her two sisters were brought up strictly in the Victorian way and were not allowed to associate with other children. All her life she has gone on painting srfid to this day she can produce a feathery

vignette of the sun rising over a treefringed harbpuf, which recalls the fragile old-fashioned engravings that make Victorian first editions things to prize.

Her room is hung with small portraits which at first sight appear to be daguerreotypes—bewhiskered men and women with lace caps or plumed bonnets over high-piled coils of hair—reproduced with absolute fidelity. But under a strong light they are found to be pencil portraits. Most of them were drawn many years ago, but the frames are of more recent workmanship. Miss Whiting made them herself —some within the last few years. She* has also designed and made a wall fitting for displaying pictures and china.