PROVENANCE

Collection of the artist's family since 1930

Dorothy Kate Richmond (known as Dolla) was born in Parnell in 1861, the daughter of artist James Crowe Richmond. When Dolla was four years old her mother died and the family moved to Taranaki, then to Nelson around 1869. From these early years, James Richmond passed on a love of drawing and painting to his daughter. In 1873 he took his three eldest children to London. The young Dolla spent time in Zurich and during 1875 and 1876 she was in Dresden. These early travels and a well rounded education of which drawing and painting comprised a key component, laid the foundation for two lifelong pursuits. In 1875, Dolla attended Bedford College for Woman in London and began a two year course at the Slade School of Fine Art. In 1880 the standard of her work gained a Slade scholarship. Returning to Nelson in late 1880 Dolla was one of a small group of New Zealand women artists to have received formal training.

On her return to Nelson she kept house for her father and in 1883 was appointed art mistress at the newly established Nelson College for Girls. Travels to study and paint in Europe took place in 1885 and with her father in 1889. By 1890 Dolla was working with the local sketch club and had become an artist member of the New Zealand Academy of Fine Arts. She moved with her father to Wellington in 1895 and by 1896 was studying with Glasgow born impressionist, James Nairn. The death of her father in 1898 left Dolla financially independent and once again she departed for Europe.

In 1901 Richmond met fellow expatriate Frances Hodgkins at a summer school at Caudebec, Normandy tutored by English watercolourist Norman Garstin. A close cameraderie developed and together they travelled to France and Italy painting scenes of village life, often en plein air. 1902 saw the pair in Cornwall at the Newlyn artists' colony. The strong natural light and inexpensive cost of living in St Ives, Newlyn and Penzance attracted artists such as Elizabeth and Stanhope Forbes and New Zealander, Margaret Stoddart, all of whom Dolla worked with.