Hilda Rix Nicholas

Hilda Rix Nicholas (1884–1961) was an Australian artist. After
training under leading Heidelberg School painter, Frederick McCubbin,
she travelled to Europe in 1907 and studied in both London and Paris.
Visiting Tangiers in 1912, she was one of the first Australians to paint
post-impressionist landscapes and was made a member of the Société des
Peintres Orientalistes Français. During World War I, she met and

married Major George Nicholas; she spent only three days with him before
he returned to duty and was killed on the Western Front. Returning to
Australia, she held an exhibition of over a hundred works in Melbourne's
Guild Hall. Many sold, including In Picardy, purchased by the National
Gallery of Victoria. Spending the mid-1920s in Europe, she enjoyed
significant success and was made an Associate of the Société Nationale
des Beaux-Arts. In 1926, Rix Nicholas returned again to Australia. A
staunch critic of modernism, she disdained emerging artists such as
Russell Drysdale and William Dobell. She fell out of step with
Australian art and her last solo show was in 1947. Her works, which
portray an Australian pastoral ideal, are held in most major Australian
collections.