Stella Bowen

Infobox Person
name = Stella Bowen


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birth_name = Esther Gwendolyn "Stella" Bowen
birth_date = 16 May 1893
birth_place = North Adelaide, South Australia
death_date = 30 October, 1947
death_place = Green End, Essex England
death_cause = colon cancer
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occupation = Artist and writer
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children = Esther Julia Madox
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Esther Gwendolyn "Stella" Bowen (1893–1947), was an Australian artist, born in North Adelaide in the southern part of the country.cite web |title= Bowen, Esther Gwendolyn (Stella) (1893 - 1947) |publisher= Australian Dictionary of Biography On-line edition |url= http://www.adb.online.anu.edu.au/biogs/A070369b.htm |accessdate= 2007-07-23] As a young girl, Bowen enjoyed drawing and convinced her mother to allow her to study with Margaret Preston. However, her desire to pursue art training in Melbourne was thwarted by her mother's ill health and reluctance to let her daughter follow such a career.

When her mother died in 1914, Bowen left for England with a return ticket and an allowance of £20 per month. In cosmopolitan London, she studied at the Westminster School of Art and mixed in the exhilarating company of writers, artists, poets and political activists.

In 1917, Bowen met and fell in love with the writer Ford Madox Ford.cite book |last= Modjeska |first= Drusilla |authorlink=Drusilla Modjeska|title= Stravinsky's Lunch |publisher= Picador |date= 1999 |location= Sydney |isbn= 0 330 36259 3] She was twenty-four, he was forty-three. The couple fled to rural England where their daughter Julie was born in 1920. But by 1922 the family were fed up with the hardships of life in the English countryside and moved temporarily to France. They soon decided to remain in France and moved to Paris.

Caught up in the bohemian café society of Paris, Ford started a literary magazine and was a leading figure among the expatriate writers. Bowen, meanwhile, found her first studio but managed little time for painting in between attending to the needs of Ford and their daughter.

Bowen separated from Ford in 1927. It was a difficult time for her but it did give her the time and space to pursue her art. She began to gain some portrait commissions but still struggled to earn enough money. In 1932, she went to the United States at the invitation of friends, who helped her in finding painting jobs. Returning to France she found she could not afford to remain in Paris and returned to England on her fortieth birthday.

Although Bowen continued to paint she did not earn enough from painting and commissions to make ends meet and for many years supplemented her income by writing an art review column in the "News Cronicle" and teaching. ] Because of her relationship with Ford Maddox Ford she was given an advance to write a biography and produced "Drawn from life : a memoir ". ] This book came out to glowing reviews. ]

The Second World War brought a surprising, new chapter in Stella's career. In 1944, she was appointed an official war artist by the Australian War Memorial.cite web |title= Stella Bowen, Art, War and Love |publisher= Australian War Memorial |url= http://www.awm.gov.au/stella/index.asp |accessdate=2007-07-23] Theaden Brocklebank, a producer with the Pacific service of the BBC and wife of William Keith Hancock, had arranged for Stella Bowen to record regular talks for Australian audiences about her wartime experiences. These talks provided Bowen with additional income during a difficult time and they resulted in the offer of the position of war artist.cite web |title= Stella Bowen - Art, Love and War |publisher= Australian War Memorial |url= http://www.awm.gov.au/stella/detail.asp?period=5&id=72 |accessdate= 2007-07-23]

Bowen's brief as a war artist was to depict the activities of the Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF) stationed in England. She also painted portraits of military commanders and Australian prisoners of war who had recently been repatriated from Europe. One of the first women artists to be appointed, ] Stella completed her last painting in 1947. She died later that year of colon cancer, having never returned to Australia.

Two portraits by Bowen are in the National Portrait Gallery collection, George Douglas Howard Cole and Dame Margaret Isabel Cole.cite web |title= Stella Bowen (1893-1947)|publisher= National Portrait Gallery, St Martin's Place, London |url= http://www.npg.org.uk/live/search/person.asp?LinkID=mp07850&role=art |accessdate= 2007-07-23]

Bibliography

* "Drawn from Life : A Memoir " (1940) (reprinted Pan Macmillan, 1999, ISBN 0330361643)

Notes

References

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External links

* [http://www.abc.net.au/dimensions/dimensions_in_time/Transcripts/s707519.htm Rebels, Stella Bowen] Interview by George Negus of Suzanne Brookman, Stella Bowen's niece, and Lola Wilkinson, Curator of the Australian War Memorial exhibition 21/10/2002
* [http://www.civilization.ca/cwm/artwar/artists/stella-bowen_e.html Australian Artist - Stella Bowen] Canadian War Museum (Retrieved 23-July-2007)

Persondata
NAME=Bowen, Stella
ALTERNATIVE NAMES=
SHORT DESCRIPTION=artist and writer
DATE OF BIRTH= 16 May 1893
PLACE OF BIRTH= Adelaide, South Australia, Australia
DATE OF DEATH= 30 October, 1947
PLACE OF DEATH= England