Sheila Hawkins Sold at Auction Prices

Illustrator, b. 1905 - d. 1999

See Artist Details

0 Lots

Sort By:

Categories

    Auction Date

    Seller

    Seller Location

    Price Range

    to
    • Sheila Hawkins (1905-1999)
      Jun. 20, 2017

      Sheila Hawkins (1905-1999)

      Est: $1,500 - $2,500

      Three Pigeons acrylic on board, signed l.r.c. 'Sheila Hawkins' 34 x 42.5 cm Artist's label verso with title

      Shapiro Auctioneers
    • Sheila Hawkins (1905-1999)
      May. 09, 2017

      Sheila Hawkins (1905-1999)

      Est: $2,000 - $3,000

      Sheila Hawkins (1905-1999) Three Pigeons acrylic on board, signed l.r.c. 'Sheila Hawkins' Artist's label verso with title

      Shapiro Auctioneers
    • SHEILA HAWKINS MFPS (AUSTRALIAN 1905-1999), untitled, circa 1960s, three pigeons on blue ground, acrylic on board, signed,
      Nov. 29, 2016

      SHEILA HAWKINS MFPS (AUSTRALIAN 1905-1999), untitled, circa 1960s, three pigeons on blue ground, acrylic on board, signed,

      Est: £200 - £400

      SHEILA HAWKINS MFPS (AUSTRALIAN 1905-1999), untitled, circa 1960s, three pigeons on blue ground, acrylic on board, signed,

      Chiswick Auctions
    • SHEILA HAWKINS, (1905 - 1999), CATALAN MARKET, c.1939, oil on canvas
      May. 04, 2016

      SHEILA HAWKINS, (1905 - 1999), CATALAN MARKET, c.1939, oil on canvas

      Est: $30,000 - $40,000

      SHEILA HAWKINS, (1905 - 1999), CATALAN MARKET, c.1939, oil on canvas DIMENSIONS: 70.0 - 94.0 cm SIGNED: signed lower right: SHEILA HAWKINS inscribed on label verso: No. - / Oil - CATALAN MARKET - SHEILA HAWKINS - 35 HAYMARKET 8WI PROVENANCE: Paisnel Gallery, London, acquired from the artist c.1990 Private collection, Tasmania, acquired from the above, 1990s EXHIBITED: Goupil Gallery Salon, 33rd exhibition, New Burlington Galleries, London, July 1939, cat. 323 ESSAY: In 1939 Sheila Hawkins exhibited Catalan Market and Gypsy Mother at the Goupil Gallery Salon. During the war Hawkins became interested in activities that received little or no official recognition, yet were a vital part of the war on the home front. Possibly through Jimmy Cook, she learned of the stationing of Australian soldiers working in forestry units in Scotland supplying timber to the war zones. The Australian Forestry Company had originally expected to be sent to France, but by the time they arrived France was occupied by German forces. Much to their frustration, they found themselves felling trees in Britain instead and in the meantime were still expected to continue with regular military training. In 1941 Sheila Hawkins took two weeks’ leave from her RAAF work in London, to witness and document their experiences. In later correspondence with the Australian War Memorial, she writes admiringly of these men: ‘...there was no way to suggest the amazing precision and perfection of every movement – the speed with which everything was started and finished before I could catch enough of the action.’ The following year found her recording RAF squadron records, at the time under conditions of tight security, in Wales. Back in London she completed four portraits of RAAF members, c.1942. Examples of this work are now held in the collection of the Australian War Memorial, Canberra. Around this period her drawings also record the life of women operating the coal barges on London canals. Some of these compositions were worked up into murals she painted for the Force’s canteens in London. With the breakdown of her marriage during the war and a newly born daughter to raise, she continued working throughout this period on a series of illustrated books for children, notably with a commission to work with five other artists producing the first series of Penguin Puffin children’s books at Cowells, the printers in Ipswich. Despite her long absence she continued to find inspiration in her memories of Australia. Little Grey Colo, the story of a koala, appeared in 1939, and Animals of Australia in 1944. Once war was over she returned to a studio in Hampstead where she remembers she had used a number of old paintings tacked up against the windows as black out. In 1946 she became a founder member of the Hampstead Artist’s Council, set up by Richard Carline and fellow artist, Fred Uhlman. Her feisty personality led to a clash with publishers Angus & Robertson over her Australian Animals and Birds project. With all the associated problems involved in illustrating and selling her work, Hawkins made a return visit to Australia. She settled at Darling Point in Sydney, staying there for about three years. In 1949 she worked on murals for the refurnishing of the troopship M.V Manoora, which was being converted into a passenger ship. Back in the UK by 1951, a collection of her animal illustrative work was shown at the Geffrye Museum in London. She took on a number of further commissions illustrating the works of other authors, but by the mid- 1960s decided to concentrate on her painting once more. She went on to exhibit regularly as a member of the Free Painters and Sculptors group and the Ridley Society, another group of London artists. We are grateful to Emma Hicks, London for her assistance with this essay Sources: Kerr, J. (ed.), Heritage: The National Women’s Art Book, Craftsman House, Sydney, 1995 Muir, M., Sheila Hawkins: Profile of an Illustrator, M. Muir, Adelaide, 1998 The Studio: An Illustrated Magazine of Fine and Applied Art, Studio International, London, 1939, vol. 118 Sheila Hawkins Obituary, The Times, London, England, 6 February 1999, p. 24 Dear, W., ‘A child of the animal world’ in ‘Guardian Obituaries’, The Guardian, London, 30 January 1999, viewed 20 February 2016, Design & Art Australia Online, viewed 20 February 2016 Wootton, D., ‘Obituary: Sheila Hawkins’ in ‘Culture’, The Independent, London, 22 February 1999, viewed 20 February 2016, ‘History of the HAC’, Hampstead Artists Council, London, viewed 20 February 2016, Conversations with the artist’s daughter, Anna de Polnay, London Sheila Hawkins Archives, Victoria and Albert Museum, London

      Deutscher and Hackett
    • SHEILA HAWKINS, (1905 - 1999), GYPSY MOTHER, c.1939, oil on linen
      May. 04, 2016

      SHEILA HAWKINS, (1905 - 1999), GYPSY MOTHER, c.1939, oil on linen

      Est: $15,000 - $20,000

      SHEILA HAWKINS, (1905 - 1999) GYPSY MOTHER, c.1939, oil on linen DIMENSIONS: 60.0 - 49.0 cm SIGNED: signed lower right: HAWKINS PROVENANCE: Paisnel Gallery, London, acquired from the artist c.1990 Private collection, Tasmania, acquired from the above, 1990s EXHIBITED: Goupil Gallery Salon, 33rd exhibition, New Burlington Galleries, London, July 1939, cat. 318 (as ‘Gipsy Mother’) ESSAY: Sheila Hawkins was born in the remote Western Australian goldfield town of Kalgoorlie in 1905. Her father was an architect and surveyor and her mother was among the earliest pioneers of the town. She spent her early childhood there before the family with four children moved to Perth, then Melbourne during the First World War. In Melbourne she completed her schooling at Toorak College followed by a brief period at the National Gallery of Victoria Art School. Still only aged 18 she moved to Sydney and began to make a living doing pokerwork, which involved burning designs and lettering onto skins often to be used as legal documents. She completed a course in commercial art at Sydney Technical College and exhibited in mixed and solo shows in Melbourne and Sydney in 1930–31. The National Gallery of Victoria purchased a drawing, The Drift Net from her first exhibition in 1930. In 1931, with Australia in the midst of Depression, she moved to London and took a job as a poster artist with Shell Mex Advertising, the company’s first female employee. In London she began a long career in illustrating children’s books, with her first book, Margaret Brown’s Black Tuppenny , published by Heinemann in 1932. In 1934 she joined her New Zealand friends, the artist James Cook and his wife, Ruth to live in Catalonia on the Iberian Peninsula. They shared a primitive apartment in Gerona providing Sheila Hawkins with the opportunity to paint every day. The move to Spain was a gamble but the opportunity to just live simply and paint day by day was one too great to miss. The three of them moved into a couple of rooms above a small shop in Gerona, and Sheila and ‘Jimmy’ were free to go out and paint on a daily basis. Often cold and hungry, Hawkins nonetheless always remembered this experience as the best year of her life and its memory was to influence her output throughout the rest of her career. However, as civil unrest began to take hold, they were eventually persuaded to leave by locals who warned them of the mounting dangers which led to the outbreak of the Spanish Civil War (1936–39). Returning to England, Sheila Hawkins continued to work on images from her life in Spain which would have included her Catalan market and gypsy subjects. One senses that although she needed to earn a living she was tempted to keep these works as a reminder of her experiences. Having enjoyed some success with her earliest illustrated book, Black Tuppenny, Frederick Warne published a second children’s book, Ena, Meena, Mina, Mo and Benjamin in 1935. Sheila Hawkins’ marriage to Max Bowden in 1934 took her to a life in rural Northumberland and then the Cotswolds, so that by the mid 1930s she was largely absorbed by her illustrative work, which despite her always feeling it was secondary to her painting, brought her a much needed income. She returned to London and began to exhibit with the Women’s International Art Club. But it was to her Spanish sketch books that she once again turned to for inspiration for her next book, Pepito (‘A little Spanish boy’s adventures with his donkey and a little girl called Conchita’). Published by Hamish Hamilton, it was exhibited at the Times Book Exhibition that year. Two more books followed in 1938 and 1939, but during the war she found work in a civilian capacity in a public relations job at RAAF Headquarters in London. In 1939 Sheila Hawkins exhibited the two Catalan paintings on offer at the Goupil Gallery Salon, London and another work at the Society of Women Artists. At this stage she was living in a small flat she and her husband rented on Haymarket. We are grateful to Emma Hicks, London for her assistance with this essay

      Deutscher and Hackett
    Lots Per Page:

    Popular Artists

    Devices

    Get Invaluable on Your Phone

    Download the app via text link to get instantly notified if you’re outbid and receive auction reminders so you never miss out!

    Bid On-the-Go!

    Download the Invaluable app and never miss an auction from your iOS or Android device.

    App Store badgeGoogle Play badge
    Invaluable Logo

    As the world's leading online auction marketplace, thousands of auction houses use Invaluable to deepen relationships with millions of clients around the world. Stay connected to the things you love with curated items and auctions sent to your inbox.

    You can unsubscribe at any time. View ourPrivacy Policy.

    © 1986-2024 Invaluable, LLC. and participating auction houses. All Rights Reserved.

    TermsSubscription AgreementPrivacy PolicyCopyrightGDPR InfoPrivacy ChoiceYour Privacy ChoicesSite Map