WomenArtists

Ida Darling a brief early shining star of Adelaide female artists during 1860s/70s, in footsteps of Ann-Marie Benham

Ida Darling a brief early shining star of Adelaide female artists during 1860s/70s, in footsteps of Ann-Marie Benham
Magpies (left) oil on canvas by Ann-Marie Benham, possibly mid 1850s, and Ida's Darling's The Athenian (1869).

Ida Darling became a brief shining star of Adelaide women artists in the 19th Century’s second half. Darling gained more prominence than others such as  “Misses Addison, Hunt, Stonehouse” in the South Australian Society of Arts reports.

Ann-Marie Benham had also attracted notice. She taught Rosa Fiveash and featured in the society’s exhibitions, including submitting her design in 1863 for the society’s medal, competing against Charles Hill, R.E. Minchin, Alexander Schramm and Max Weidenbach. Minchin’s design won.

Charles Hill, who ran the South Australian School of Design, sponsored by the society, used Ida Darling as a prime example of the school’s achievements. Hill was responding to criticism by John Hood, who became a teacher at the school, at what Hood saw as the poor quality of its students.

In replay, Hill cited school of design student Ida Darling among “many scintillations of rising genius in our colonial youth”. Hill listed the many society exhibition prizes won by Darling, “the beauty of whose works was never disputed”.

Darling, a sketcher, watercolourist and chalk colourist, was the second of eight children of Henry Smith Darling— an Adelaide tailor, gold prospector and later property owner — and his wife Rosina. Born in Westminster, Middlesex, Darling emigrated as an infant with her family on the Sibella, arriving in Port Adelaide in 1848.

The family was one of the earliest to settle in the Adelaide inner north suburb of Medindie, living in a cottage in the Main North Road that contained a gallery of Darling’s artwork. In 1868, the Adelaide Observer cited her work, particularly her coloured sketch Children with Flowers, as proof of the worth of the school of design’s instruction. She also exhibited outside the “student” class as a “lady amateur”.

Darling’s prize-winning pictures included: Jessie (1867), Grace (1867), Mercy (1867), The Athenian (1869), Messiah (1871), Purity (1871), and Forgiveness (1871). The Athenian was a departure from the biblical or moral subjects of the other works, and might be a portrait.

Darling died at the family cottage in 1875 at the age of 28.

Other related ADELAIDE AZ articles

Domestic servants (at left) in the garden with children for the photograph of David Teakle and his family at Cherrington, Mount Barker, around 1880. Top left: John Bray, who wanted domestic servants to be able to take civil court action against employers. Bottom left: Samuel Tomkinson.
Class >
Domestic service in last throes from 1880s in South Australia with clashes in parliament over fixing the shortage
READ MORE+
Artist David Wilkie was curator and then first director of South Australia's art gallery. Right: A 1931 drawing by Wilkie of part of the Adelaide Destitute Asylum in Kintore Avenue, Adelaide city. 
Artists >
David Wilkie, artist, curator from 1926 and popular first director from 1934 of South Australia's art gallery
READ MORE+
A self portrait of Charles Hill and one of his early Adelaide colonial street scenes.
Artists >
Charles Hill a founder of South Australian Society of Arts (1856), first master of the school of design (1861)
READ MORE+
Nora Stewart pupils performing Margaret Morris barefoot dancing in the garden of lady mayoress Jean Bonython in about 1927. Image by J. McKenzie, courtesy State Library of South Australia
Theatre >
Nora Stewart legendary Adelaide dance teacher to Robert Helpmann, Elizabeth Dalman amid thousands for 50 years
READ MORE+
A Marie Tuck self portrait and her oil on board Church service in Brittany, from her years in France.
International >
Marie Tuck becomes an Adelaide art educator after being unable to return as an artist to her beloved France
READ MORE+
The Women’s Information Service, now on the ground floor of the Office of Women, 91-97 Grenfell Street, Adelaide.
Welfare >
Women's Information Service carries on Deborah McCulloch's novel South Australian 1978 switchboard idea
READ MORE+

 

 
©2025 Adelaide AZ | Privacy | Terms & Disclaimer | PWA 1.1.58