KEMBLE, HERBERT (1894-1986)

"Pittwater Bay" (c.1960)
oil on board
51 x 76cm
signed on verso
*private collection, Turramurra
 
Herbert Frederick Kemble Kemble was a 20th century painter and illustrator originally from New Zealand. He served as an ANZAC in WWI, part of the earliest waves of AIF soldiers who stormed ashore at Gallipoli. He was wounded in the leg during the attack on Capel Helles in May 1915 and coalesced at a temporary military hospital in Malta. He returned to terrible conditions at ANZAC for a week but fell ill and was repatriated to New Zealand and discharged..He came to Sydney in 1920 and from 1941 he worked as a commercial artist, art director, newspaper and magazine illustrator. He exhibited his paintings in the Archibald, Wynne, Sulman and Blake Prize exhibitions. His style was influenced by the introduction of Modernism in Europe and later in Australia in the 1920s..From 1952 he was a committee member of the Contemporary Art Society. He held several exhibitions in Sydney, but also in London as a member of the Royal Watercolour Society..His work is represented in numerous important collections, most notably the Bathurst Regional Art Gallery, which holds eight works.