English-born Australian painter and teacher, Tudor St George Tucker was born on 28 April 1862 at Finchley, Middlesex, England, the son of an army officer. He migrated to Melbourne in 1881 for the good of his health.

Tucker studied at the National Gallery School, Melbourne, from 1883 to 1887, where fellow students included Rupert Bunny , E. Phillips Fox , Florence Fuller , John Longstaff and Arthur Streeton , and he joined plein air painting excursions with Fox, Longstaff, Frederick McCubbin , and others. In 1887, he left for Europe, studying in Paris alongside Fox at the Académie Julian and, in 1889, at the Ecole des Beaux-Arts. In 1890, Charles Conder wrote to friends in Melbourne that Fox and Tucker were thought to be the leading Australian artists in Paris. Tucker joined the artists’ colony at Etaples in 1891, where he painted his first major picture, Une pêcheuse de crevettes .

Tucker returned to Australia in 1892. In 1893, Tucker and Fox began the Melbourne School of Art, based on the French atelier system. From 1894, they ran a summer school at Charterisville, where, with an emphasis on drawing from a live model and painting outdoors, Tucker and Fox provided a popular alternative to the traditional approach offered at the Gallery School. Their students included Ambrose Patterson.

In his own work, Tucker demonstrated a sensitive appreciation of the effects of light and the use of colour. He returned to Europe in 1899, and settled in Chelsea. Tudor St George Tucker died of tuberculosis on 21 December 1906, aged 44.

Writers:

Gray, Dr Anne Note: Head of Australian Art, National Gallery of Australia, Canberra, ACT

Date written:

2011

Last updated:

2011