John Mather spent his youth sketching and painting.[2] He had access to the art collection of the Duke of Hamilton and knew the works well.[3] His first art lessons, when about 15 years old, were with Thomas Fairbairn (1820-1884), an art teacher and prominent local watercolourist in Glasgow.[4][5]
John Mather studied at the Royal Glasgow Institute of the Fine Arts[1] and he exhibited his first work there around 1870.[notes 1][6][7] From Glasgow, John Mather went to Edinburgh, where he studied at the school of the National Gallery. In Edinburgh he painted the older parts of the city, and these paintings sold well.[8][9]
In 1873 – 74, John Mather went to Paris and remarked:
I saw the miles of pictures that are to be seen in Paris, and studied them as well as I could.[10]
After Paris he went to London, worked and painted as he had done in Edinburgh. Subsequently, he went back to Scotland and continued at his art.[11]
Arrival and establishment in Melbourne
Emigrating to Melbourne in 1878, John Mather listed his occupation as painter. [12] On the 3rd December 1878, John Mather was elected as an Associate of the Victorian Academy of Arts.[13] In April 1879 he exhibited 14 works at the Annual Exhibition of the Victorian Academy of Arts [14] and was noted as a large exhibiter.[15]
In 1879 he was described as a young artist under engagement to Messrs. Gillow and Co., the firm entrusted with the decoration of Mandeville Hall at Toorak, now known as Loreto Mandeville Hall.[16] On the 19th December 1879, John Mather’s tender of £4700 [17] for the internal decorations of the Exhibition Buildings was accepted by the Building Committee of the International Exhibition.[18]
On the 27th October 1881 he was elected to the Council of the Victorian Academy of Arts.[19] In April 1882 he exhibited a number of oil paintings and watercolours at the annual exhibition of the Academy. [20] Noted for his industriousness:
There are no less than 11 works bearing his name. Most of them are of rural or woodland scenery, rendered with much artistic feeling, whether in oil or water-colour.[21]
He was married on the 16th October 1882[22] to Miss Jessie Pines Best, a daughter of Captain James Best, a pilot of Hobson's Bay. Together they had one daughter and three sons; Margaret Playfair, John Allan, Louis Melville (died in infancy), and Leslie Frank Strand (died in 1919).[23][24]
A 'Plein Air' Pioneer
John Mather was an early practitioner of painting en plein air. [25] Written in 1888:
For the last eleven years Mr Mather has been travelling all through Victoria in the employment of his brush and pencil and has given to the public so many examples of his skill in depicting the most picturesque localities ... He has travelled all over Victoria, but especially gave great attention to the scenery of the Ovens and Murray District and the scenery about the source of the Yarra.[26]
In 1890 when completing a painting of Mt Feathertop, he undertook a daily walk of 12 miles for a fortnight to complete the work. [27]
His affinity with en plein air is revealed when discussing his favorite paintings in the National Gallery of Victoria. Commenting on Peter Graham’s Autumnal Showers he states;
he was in intimate converse with nature, when every new effect was an unspeakable joy, a new delight and a fresh discovery...[the work] ... must have been a labour of love.
In 1906 he considered Boulevard Montmartre by Pissarro to be the best painting purchased through the Felton Bequest, both for its artistic rendering of a very difficult subject, and for its remarkable truth to nature. He described it as a splendid example of the French School of Impressionist at its best. He hoped the work would encourage artists and citizens in Melbourne to see the beauty of their own streets and goes on to state:
The subject itself is not finer than many of our Melbourne streets; it only requires the artist; the life, movement, and interest are just as intense here as in Paris. The summer is longer here; the sunlight is brighter; the sky more blue, but the patron is conspicuous by his absence.[28]
In subsequent decades Australian Impressionism would be recognised and celebrated.
Three of Mather's own paintings, Autumn in the Fitzroy Gardens in oils, and Morning, Lake Omeo and Wintry Weather, Yarra Glen, both watercolours, were purchased by the National Gallery of Victoria.[1]
Residences, Studios and other Addresses
Mather had a number of homes, studios and other addresses throughout his career, including:
Artistic Stationery Company (Buxton's) incorporating business of F. Hyman & J. Mather, Artists, Colormen and Stationers and Decorating Business, 69, 71, 131 Swanston Street and 84 Elizabeth Street, Melbourne [40]
Business
1886
- 1888
Owned property in Castella Street (now Maroondah Highway) (1879) Lilydale Road overlooking the river (1880) and Blannin Street Healesville (1881) [44]
Mr John Mather is reported to have, had a wide celebrity as a teacher, and ... there are artists of repute in Melbourne now who commenced their careers in his Austral School in Collins Street.[60] As well as studio lessons he led outdoor sketching excursions, often along the coast, where students used pencil, pen and ink and watercolor.[61]
John Mather's grave with no memorial, Cheltenham Pioneer Cemetery
Written just thirteen years after his death;
The war claimed his only son and his daughter who was well known in Melbourne music circles, lives now in the United States. It is as if "the place thereof knoweth him no more " But how can an artist ever be forgotten as long as human eyes are irresistibly drawn to the quiet beauty of his pictures on the wall?[77]
In July 2023 a small plaque was placed on the grave simply stating:
Mr John Mather 1848 – 1916 The beauty of his Art endures.
The words, his Art endures, refers to his painting and etching but also the art he nurtured as a mentor, teacher and one of the founding fathers of art in Victoria.[78]
^John Mather’s 1904 Exhibition Catalogue of Australian Landscapes lists the Isle of Mull, Scotland exhibited in Glasgow 30 years ago suggesting 1874. The article in the Weekly Times, 8 Aug 1908 Page 12, The Artists’ President suggests around 1868.
^Jessie Traill took lessons in etching from John Mather at his Austral Art School. In 1903 she kept a notebook of her lessons commenting on the etchings within it as they progress through various states. The notebook details her active engagement in the print making process and the tuition of John Mather. Together with jottings of sales, news clippings and a congratulatory letter from John Mather, her early success with the medium is documented.
Jessie Traill's 1903 notebook [63] reveals in intimate detail her lessons with John Mather.
For example, the notes on an etching that Jessie Traill considered a failure: Ground marked twice lines far too open & apart no mysterious depths drawing shaky, confused & altogether a failure, Mr Mather could not tell which way up.
Mounted at 90 degrees from her notes and without visual cues, the correct orientation of the etching is difficult to determine.
Later in the etching, Boat Builder's Shop, she includes some common place items in the foreground that leave no doubt as to the orientation of that etching.
Boat Builder's Shop was exhibited in Melbourne, Adelaide and Launceston in 1905. The etching was praised in reviews and sold for 15/0. John Mather sent her a congratulatory letter which she mounts in the notebook together with news clippings of the day.
In 1906 she notes that the etching has been sold to Lady Northcote, wife of Australia's Governor-General Sir Henry Northcote 1904 -1908.
^Mead, Stephen F. (December 2011). "The Search for Artistic Professionalism in Melbourne: the activities of the Buonarotti Club, 1883 -1887". The Latrobe Journal. 88.
^Victorian Academy of Arts, 1879 The Ninth Exhibition Catalogue p.13
^Victorian Academy of Arts, 1879 The Tenth Exhibition Catalogue p.14
^Victorian Academy of Arts, 1879 The Eleventh Exhibition Catalogue p.15
^Table Talk 26 March 1891 page 12, Victorian Artists Society Exhibition Catalogues 1898 -1913, Sands and McDougall’s Melbourne and Suburban Directory 1900 & 1910
^Brighton City Council Rates Records 1895-1900, Sands & McDougall’s Melbourne and Suburban Directory 1900
^Victorian Artists Society Exhibition Catalogues 1900,1901 & 1902, The Argus 5 Oct 1901, Advertisements p. 14
^Victorian Artists Society Exhibition Catalogues 1903 - 1912, The Age 1 Jun 1901 Art Notes p 8, Sands & McDougall’s Melbourne and Suburban Directory 1905-1910
^The Bulletin, Vol.33 No.1668 1 Feb 1912 p.22 Melbourne Chatter
^Exhibition of Mr J. Mather’s Paintings 26 September 1912 Catalogue
^The Age 5 Nov 1932 p4. Australian Artists of the Past
^Lee, M.A, 1982 The Etched Work of Jessie C.A. Traill 1881 -1967 pp. 22 & 24
^Jo Oliver, 2020, Jessie Traill A Biography, pp 29-30
^Jessie Traill (1903) 'Copper Plate Etchings and Notes thereon, J.C.A. Traill 1903'. Jessie Traill Papers, State Library of Victoria, Ms 7975, Box F798/5 (b)
