Hodgkins, Frances (1869–1947)

New Zealand painter. Born Frances Mary Hodgkins in Dunedin, New Zealand, April 28, 1869; died near Dorchester, Dorset, England, May 13, 1947; dau. of William Mathew Hodgkins (attorney, artist, and founder of Otago Society of Artists [c.1833–1898]) and Rachel Owen Parker (Australian); younger sister of Isabel Hodgkins Field (artist); studied oil painting with G.P. Nerli and ierre Marcel-Béronneau; attended Dunedin School of Art and Design,895–96; never married; no children.

One of the most important artists of her era and the 1st New Zealand artist to gain such prominence, initially painted a handful of landscapes of New Zealand and a large number of paintings of Maori women and began exhibiting at Christchurch and Dunedin (1886); work accepted by Royal Academy in England (1903–05); settled in Paris (1908), where she became the 1st woman to teach at Académie Colarossi; established her own watercolor academy in Paris (1910), catering predominantly to women students; at onset of WWI, moved to England; exhibited with London Group and became a member of Calico Printers Association and Manchester Society of Painters (1928); joined the progressive Seven and Five Society (1929); had a studio in Dorset; had retrospective exhibition of 64 paintings and17 drawings (1902–46) at Lefevre Gallery (1946); worked with landscapes, still lifes, and portraits; paintings include Loveday and Ann: two women with a basket of flowers (1915), The Edwardians (c. 1918), Double Portrait (c. 1922), Spanish Shrine (c. 1933), Flatford Mill (1930, London, Tate Gallery), Seated Woman (1925–30, London, Tate Gallery) and The Courtyard in Wartime (1944).

See also M. Evans, ed. Francis Hodgkins (1948); E.H. McCormick, Portrait of Frances Hodgkins (1981) and The Expatriate (1954); and Women in World History.