Provenance Private Collection, Auckland, acquired from the artist by descent

Born in Auckland, Lois White studied at the Elam School of Fine Arts under Archie Fisher. At Elam she met Ida Eise who became a lifelong friend. White taught for 8 years at Takapuna Grammar School, before becoming a tutor in painting at Elam until her retirement in 1963.

During the 1930s and early 1940s Lois White was considered a mainstream Auckland artist with a significant national profile. Many of her figurative compositions were reproduced in local newspapers and the topical allegory of her work was commented on in reviews

By the mid-20th century, there was strong institutional fixation on emerging modernism and landscape art in New Zealand. It is therefore not surprising that Anna Lois White found herself marginalised by the art world throughout her career. Despite the knowledge that her work did not align to institutional tastes or trends, White pursued an individual tradition of classically-inspired symbolism integrating allegorical, art historical, biblical and political concerns. In the 1940s, given the limited materials available during wartime, White had to abandon the large-scale compositions in oil that had dominated her output in the previous decade. She began working on a smaller scale, primarily in watercolour as can be seen in the works illustrated in this catalogue.

Exhibiting regularly from the 1930's and into the 1950's, Lois White was often singled out in group shows, but it was not until after she was 70, that the first comprehensive solo exhibition of her work was held.