Theresa Walker (née Chauncy) was an original. One contemporary, a Mrs Edwards of Germanton, described her as ‘one of the three great women I have known during a long life.’ On the other hand, the Rev. Mr Holden of Adelaide wrote of her ‘marked peculiarities of character’, and her own brother noted her ‘lack of discretion in reference to matters of every day life.’ Notwithstanding (or perhaps on account of) this apparent eccentricity, Walker is an important though neglected figure in early colonial settler art: Australia’s first woman sculptor. She and her sister, the equally-gifted painter Martha Berkeley, were amongst the most accomplished artists working in South Australia during the 1840s. During this period Theresa made low relief wax profiles of the colony’s leading citizens. Walker also took photographs, although only a couple of her salted paper prints survive. Interestingly, in the light of this display, they are images of drawings by Yakaduna (Tommy McRae), made when she lived near him at Barnawatha in Victoria in the early 1860s.
Purchased 1999
On one level The Companion talks about the most famous and frontline Australians, but on another it tells us about ourselves.
Dr Sarah Engledow explores the lives of Sir George Grey and his wife Eliza, the subjects of a pair of wax medallions in the National Portrait Gallery's collection.
'I have just been to my dressing case to take a peep at you.
