One of the “best” rural watercolour paintings by Australian master Sir Hans Heysen has been unearthed in Germany and brought back to Australia for auction.
The work, The Camp at Wonoka Creek, was painted in 1932, shortly after Heysen made a tour to the Flinders Ranges in South Australia, a trip he made pulling what was then a revolutionary soft top camper trailer. Heysen was one of the greatest painters of Australian rural landscapes and especially scenes of grazing sheep amid large gums. Wonoka Creek is one of his best and largest watercolours of pastoral life, according to Heysen gallery curator Allan Campbell, and it has returned to Australia, almost by complete accident, in remarkable condition.
The story of the sale and provenance of the watercolour is an interesting one and linked to one of Australia’s biggest wool broking families, the McGregors. Sir James McGregor once bought a third of the wool clip on offer at a Brisbane wool sale. He was one of the most influential wool industry figures in Australia advising government on wool issues and sales over decades and during the war years. He became a leading patron of the arts and a trustee of the Art Gallery of NSW. With his family connection to South Australia he was an admirer and friend of Heysen.
Heysen went on numerous trips to the country in a Model T Ford with a trailer that had been converted to have a soft top that expanded upwards with a fly-proof wire wall around the top, so Heysen could sleep inside on his journeys. Heysen didn’t drive and often his eldest son drove him on his painting excursions and did the cooking. Heysen made 11 trips to the Flinders Ranges and on one of these trips he drew the sketch that would later become The Camp at Wonoka Creek. The Heysens then returned to the Heysen family base, The Cedars, at Hahndorf in the Adelaide Hills, where Heysen completed most of his watercolour and oil paintings.
According to the Heysen family register at Hahndorf, the Wonoka Creek work was sold to Sir James in 1958 for just over 100 pounds. The provenance of the watercolour then becomes a bit mysterious. Mr Campbell believes Sir James probably gifted the watercolour to a German industrialist associated with the wool industry. It wasn’t until recently that the watercolour was unearthed in Dusseldorf. A German art dealer bought it from a deceased estate. A Sydney art collector became aware of the existence of the watercolour and bought it from the Dusseldorf art dealer. The unnamed consignee of the work is now looking at a solid profit, with the work expected to create a record for an Australian watercolour sold at auction, according to auctioneer Jim Elder, although this is disputed by art dealers. Wonoka Creek is expected to surpass $100,000, rivalling the price paid for Heysen’s Bush Turkeys watercolour. The Camp at Wonoka Creek is one Heysen’s largest watercolours, at 55x74 centimetres.
“It is a mystery how it ended up in Germany and now has been found some 70 years later,” Mr Campbell said. “For a Heysen it is quite a large one, one of the largest I have seen. It is in absolutely excellent condition. The Heysen family have viewed it and confirmed it as a Heysen work.” Mr Campbell said Heysen made several trips to the Flinders Ranges from 1926 to 1949. “Wonoka Creek had very distinctive gums and this spurred him to stay on there.”
Australian art dealer Denis Savill, of Savill Galleries in Sydney, says because the Heysen watercolour is new to the market it will create great interest. But he doubted it would break a Heysen record, and not even come close to an Australian watercolour record (probably held by a Conrad Martens). Savill was a former stock and station agent in Rhodesia before coming to Australia and turning his attention to the art world nearly 40 years ago. “I actually didn’t find the transition that different or too hard, you just had to pay attention to what you were doing.” He said Sir James was one of many art patrons and buyers from the pastoral industry around when he first started. McGregor owned many great paintings including one by Walter Sickert. Savill says of his art career: “We always used Heysen as a barometer of the economy. If Heysens were selling well, the economy was going well, a bit like BHP.”
(Savill is closing his Paddington gallery this year. He has dispersed about 500 paintings and gifted several works to regional galleries including at Bathurst.)
Art historian and publisher Lou Klepac has just completed a monograph of Heysen, simply titled Hans Heysen. Klepac met Heysen when he was curator at the Art Gallery of South Australia and said he was one of the genuine greats of Australian painting, often unrecognised for his influence. “He was very handsome, serious and carried himself with great dignity. He was also one of the most intelligent painters of his generation. When he returned from his art studies in Europe in 1903 he became famous very quickly. His paintings were in great demand and I credit him with bringing Australia together at the time of Federation. He was awarded nine Wynne prizes, one of them within a year of returning from France. This was a great achievement. The prime minister Alfred Deakin opened his Melbourne exhibition – Melbourne loved him. Dame Nellie Melba was a great admirer of his work also.” The McGregors were close to the Heysens and Sir James paid for Heysen’s artistic daughter Nora to travel through Europe studying art. Heysen also did an oil painting of the same subject at Wonoka Creek. “This really is a terrific find and I’m really hoping an Australian gallery buys it,” Klepac said.