Margaret Preston

1875-1963

• Margaret Preston (1875 - 1963) was a well-known Australian artist who was born in Port Adelaide.

• Preston’s talents were observed throughout her training, winning her various drawing awards including the prestigious Still life Scholarship in 1897. In 1898 she furthered her studies at Adelaide's School of Design, under Hans Heysen and other artists.

• She was very influential during the 1920s to 1940s for her modernist works as a painter and printmaker and for introducing Aboriginal motifs into contemporary art.

Waratah Print 1925

Anemones

Double hibiscus oil painting1929

Fuchsias print 1928

Lorikeets, relief wood cut 1925

Clockwise from top: Banksia, 1953; Pink Gum Blossoms, 1929; and Aboriginal Design with Sturt's Pea, 1943.

Margaret Preston's Aboriginal design with Sturt's pea, 1943.

Native flowers, Aboriginal design, 1943 woodcut, printed in colour, from one masonite block

Margaret Preston, Still life: fruit (Amhem Land motif), 1941oil on canvas

From the 1920s onward, Margaret Preston became an Australian arts icon through her use of the linocut and woodblock technique. The aesthetic styles of the

Japanese, Chinese and primitive art forms of the Aboriginal communities in Australia inspired her work.

Preston created her compositions with large, flat planes of colour and a minimal palette.

In Still life: fruit (Amhem Land motif), Preston looked

to the ochre and black/white Tiwi artist palette and the dot/dash mark making technique of the native

Aborigines. The fruits and nuts were depicted as simplified forms, outlined with a thick application of

white and black paint.