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TIIE POPPY FANTASY. 

 An overmantel design in water colour, by Dora. Meeson. 



PICTURES BY AUSTRALIAN ARTISTS. 



DORA MEESON'S EXHIBITION. 



Many talented Australian artists have 

 ibeen showing their pictures here during 

 the last few weeks. Mr. Power, Mr. 

 Fox, Mrs. Fox, Mr. Coates and Dora 

 Meeson have all drawn large numbers 

 'of people to their different exhibitions. 

 It is sixteen years since Dora Meeson 

 and her htsband, George Coates, left 

 Australia for England, and all their 

 Avork has been done there and in France. 

 Mr. Coates won the Travelling Scholar- 

 ship at the Melbourne National Gallery, 

 his wife coming second to him in the 

 'Competition. Press of work prevented 

 Mr. Coates from accompanying his wife 

 -on this return visit to her native land. 

 She brings with her some twenty can- 

 vases of his and some hundred and 

 twenty of her own, but she will certainly 

 not take that number back with her, for 

 many have already been purchased for 

 Public Galleries and private collections. 

 Mr. Coates, who has a genius for por- 

 trait painting, has specialised almost en- 

 tirely on that branch of art, in which he 

 has achieved great success. " The 

 Spanish Dancer " and the " Mother and 

 Child " reproduced herewith, are won- 

 derfully fine portraits of the models 

 who posed for him. He has recently 

 rreceived a commission from the Federal 



Government to paint a portrait of Lord 

 Northcote, a former Governor-General, 

 and amongst the many prominent 

 people who have sat for him are Lord 

 and Lady Courtney of Penrith, Mrs. 

 Colthurst, Miss Cecily Hamilton the 

 dramatist, Russell the Irish poet. Both 

 artists have had pictures hung in the 

 Royal Academy, the Salon and other 

 galleries. Dora Meeson has devoted 

 herself to an entirely different style of 

 art. Some of her decorative work is 

 especially fine, the " Poppy Fantasy " 

 being a real gem, to which the repro- 

 duction here does no justice. Her pic- 

 tures of Rye bring to life again that 

 quaint old spot, which before the rest- 

 less sea had choked its harbour with 

 sand and gravel, was like Winchelsea, a 

 great Sussex seaport. Her paintings of 

 the Thames gives life-like glimpses of 

 that wonderful highway to the most 

 mighty city in the world. Mrs. Coates 

 will probably exhibit her pictures in 

 Adelaide, but goes " home " in Septem- 

 ber, meeting her husband in Italy. Over 

 four thousand people visited the Gal- 

 lery whilst her pictures hung there, and 

 everyone who saw them will hope that 

 it will not be long before she pays an- 

 other visit to the land of her birth. 



