Leila Constance McNamara Art for Sale at Auction

b. 1894 - d. 1973

Leila Constance McNamara was born on 7 June 1894 in Williamstown, South Australia. She lived mainly at 11 Arthur Street, Medindie, South Australia. She travelled to Sydney, Melbourne and Hobart during the 1920s to 1950s. She died on 11 November 1973 in Adelaide, SA.

McNamara studied under James Ashton, Will Ashton and Leslie Wilkie in Adelaide in the 1920s or thereabouts. With Leslie Wilkie she studied painting from life. In Sydney she studied with Dattilo Rubbo, James R. Jackson and modelling with Joseph Choate.

She painted mainly in oils on canvas, and also made drawings and watercolours. Her subjects were still lifes, landscapes and seascapes, painted mainly in a post-impressionist or late impressionist style. She is known to have signed works “McNAMARA” or “L.McN”. She became a Member of the Royal South Australian Society of Artists in 1915, a Fellow in 1923, Vice-President 1954-1961, and Life Member from 1962. She exhibited with the Society from 1915. She was an early member of the United Arts Club, formed in Adelaide in 1923. She also taught privately in Adelaide.