Guardians of the Hilltop
Hilda Rix Nicholas
Details
- Artist
- Hilda Rix Nicholas
- Title
- Guardians of the Hilltop
- Year
- c.1944
- Medium
- oil on canvas
- Size
- 73 x 92.5 cm
- Details
signed lower right: EH Rix Nicholas
label verso: James Boulet & Sons
Provenance
the Estate of the artist
Exhibited
Hilda Rix Nicholas 1884 -1961: Project 26, Art Gallery of New South Wales, 5 Aug - 17 Sep 1978, cat. no. 42
Further Information
Hilda Rix Nicholas married pastoralist Edgar Wright in 1928, making her home at ‘Knockalong’ in Delegate, southern New South Wales. Here she painted many nationalistic works for which she has become synonymous, such as The Fleece 1944 and, importantly, including women in the rural landscape, such as The Fair Musterer 1935 (Queensland Art Gallery). Her studio and garden at Knockalong also feature in many of her artworks, as do her family with Edgar and her son Rix, for example appearing in The Shepherd at Knockalongc.1933 (private collection) The surrounding landscape at Knockalong is an integral element in many paintings of the 1930s and 1940s, capturing the green fields, distant hills, sense of space and magnificent trees. The title here, Guardians of the Hilltop, reveals her respect, reverence and romanticism towards the Australian landscape.