ASHTON, JULIAN ROSSI (1851-1942)

"Centennial Park, Sydney" (1886)
Watercolour
26 x 36cm
Signed lower right
*private collection, Sydney
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Ashton CBE was an important English-born Australian Artist & Instructor. He studied at the West London School of Art for three years. He then went to study at the Académie Julian in Paris & began illustrating books. He also had considerable success as a painter, exhibiting at the Royal Academy of Arts. He emigrated to Melbourne in 1878, before relocating to Sydney in 1883. He was the elected president of the Art Society of NSW from 1886-92. From 1892-95 he taught classes on behalf of the society but was dismissed after choosing to exhibit his works with the newly formed Society of Artists. Ashton was instrumental in educating early Australian painters in the "en plein air" style, influenced by the Barbizon School training he received in Paris. This laid the foundations on Australia's first Impressionist painters, & the Heidelberg School, including Streeton, Roberts, Conder & McCubbin. Although not official, you could arguably call Ashton the Godfather of Australian Impressionism. In 1890 he established the The Sydney Art School (aka Julian Ashton Art School), which has become arguably Australia's greatest art school alongside the National Gallery Art School in Melbourne, producing a huge number of important Australian artists. He was appointed a Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE) in 1930. This impressive watercolour was completed on Oct 2, 1886; a busy year for Ashton. That year he travelled extensively, contributed a large number of works to the seminal "Picturesque Atlas Of Australasia" publication, became President of the Art Society Of NSW & moved from Woollahra to Bondi.