A Glistening Web: Whakatū / Nelson 11-12 October 2023

By Catherine Field-Dodgson and Michele Leggott   In mid-October, Michele and Catherine travelled to Whakatū / Nelson for a quick research trip, and to deliver the Nelson Historical Society’s 2023 James Jenkins Memorial lecture. Michele was accompanied by her friend Susan Davis. Mary Gavin, president of the Nelson Historical Society, and Yolanda Persico, the society’s secretary, Read More…

Three celmisias and a white gentian: Emily Harris at the British Museum

By Michele Leggott and Catherine Field-Dodgson The reporter from the Nelson Evening Mail is more than usually enthusiastic about the work on show at Emily Harris’s studio in Nile St East. Under the heading ‘Some Exquisite Paintings’ the range and ambition of Emily’s latest project is described in detail: Miss Harris has undoubted talent in Read More…

Thomas Kirk at Te Papa: the Campbell Island flora 

By Michele Leggott and Catherine Field-Dodgson  14 January 1890  The Colonial Government Steamship Hinemoa reaches Campbell Island with botanists Thomas Kirk and Frederick Chapman on board. The steamer has visited the Snares and the Auckland Islands, travelling ever further south into the brief sub-antarctic summer since leaving Bluff 8 January on her periodic tour of Read More…

Three Paintings from 1906

By Michele Leggott Among the artists and photographers listed in the Nelson, Marlborough and Westland volume of the Cyclopedia of New Zealand (1906) is an entry for Emily Harris: Harris, Miss Emily Cumming, Artist, Nile Street, Nelson. Miss Harris was born at Plymouth, England, and is a daughter of the late Mr. Edwin Harris, one Read More…

NZ Mountain Flora goes live!

By Michele Leggott Botanical historian F Bruce Sampson thought Emily Harris’s illustrations of New Zealand mountain flora showed the artist’s concern for fine botanical detail as well as pleasing composition: The pen, ink and watercolour originals for the unpublished New Zealand Mountain Flora (PLATES 33 and 34) are superb examples of botanical illustration. They are Read More…