English born painter, art teacher, journalist, and arts administrator. Although from a family of East Anglian origin, Daplyn was born in the East London dockland district of Stepney in late 1844. Despite living in a working class area he received a boarding school education in South London, suggesting his family were not financially disadvantaged. By the age of seventeen he was back in Stepney and was working as an apprentice engineer.
Daplyn’s interest in engineering was short lived, and during the following two decades he studied art, initially at the Slade School of Fine Art in London, and later in Paris where he trained under J.L. Gérôme and Carolus Duran. While in France in the mid 1870s he painted in Barbizon, a village, and district, made famous by the mid-century realist landscape painters Corot, Millet, Rousseau, Diaz and Daubigny. During the second half of the nineteenth century many international artists were attracted to Barbizon where they soaked-up the landscape painted by the pioneering painters. Barbizon clearly influenced Daplyn, and for the rest of his life he was an advocate of their plein air method which eschewed the grand panorama in favour of the beauty of everyday things.
While in France he became friends with the Scottish born writer Robert Louis Stevenson. Daplyn later wrote extensively of his time with Stevenson in Barbizon and Paris, these serialized articles were published in (the Australian magazine) Red Funnel between March and June 1908.
Daplyn arrived in Australia in 1881, aged thirty-seven, and while living in Melbourne he painted several works at Brighton Beach. Daplyn’s Australian debut saw him show several works with the Victorian Academy of Arts at their March 1882 exhibition. The Argus reviewer (25 March 1882, p 13) noted his landscapes:
'Another new-comer, A. Daplyn, seems to have sought inspiration in Brittany. Showery Weather (57) and The Boat-Builder (69) are painted in the low tones after the French method, and in the style of the “impressionists.” '
Although Daplyn’s work could never honestly be described as Impressionist the Argus reviewer’s description of his style was significant as it was arguably the first time the term was used in Australian art history.
While living in Melbourne, Daplyn began his long association with the Art Society of NSW (ASNSW) when he exhibited five works at their spring exhibition in 1883 and 1884. By 1884 he was living in Sydney and was painting the Hawkesbury River with Julian Ashton. In his late life memoir, Now came still evening on, (p 50) Ashton described Daplyn as a man 'of a meditative disposition and didn’t hurry through life as we younger men were doing.’
Overseas experience meant much in nineteenth century Australia and with Daplyn’s extensive training in Europe he was appointed, in 1885, as the first paid instructor at the Art Society of NSW’s school in Pitt Street, Sydney, a position he held up to 1892. His best-known students at the school were Alfred Coffey, Charles Conder, Sydney Long, B.E. Minns, and J.S. Watkins. 'Dap’, as he was known by his students, was a popular teacher although he was also known as a disciplinarian. A jocular, yet revealing, recollection of Daplyn’s life classes was published after his death in Aussie magazine (15 September 1926, p 38).
During 1893-94 Daplyn made a year long tour of Samoa, and while there he painted late life images of his famous friend Robert Louis Stevenson at his home in Vailima. Some of these pictures were exhibited in the 1894 ASNSW exhibition, and Daplyn’s travel notes and some images were published in the January 1895 issue of Cosmos magazine. That same year he was appointed to the executive council of the ASNSW, a position he held until 1913.
The 1890s was arguably his most successful period as a painter in Australia. He was a prominent and respected member of the Sydney art community and many of his works were well received by the Sydney critics, such as his landscape c.1897 In Sunlight and Shadow ( Sydney Morning Herald & Daily Telegraph 9.9.1897). Another much-reproduced work from this time was An Australian artist’s dream of Europe (c.1898).
During the late 1890s Daplyn was advertising his abilities in the Art Society exhibition catalogues as a portrait painter with prices ranging from 5 to 100 guineas. An example of his portraiture was his likeness of the President of the ASNSW, Sir Joseph Abbott.
The mid 1890s were difficult times for the Art Society that saw internal disagreement over the power and influence of amateurs and professionals within the Society. This conflict led to the formation of the Society of Artists in 1895. In 1897 Daplyn replaced G.V.F. Mann as Secretary of the ASNSW. He held this position until the rival groups reunited as the Royal Art Society of NSW (RAS) in 1903, he then served as Assistant Secretary of the RAS until 1913.
In 1898 Daplyn exhibited three works at the 'Exhibition of Australian Art in London’ at the prestigious Grafton Galleries, London. The influential British critic R.A.M. Stevenson mentioned Daplyn in his review in the Pall Mall Gazette (4 April 1898):
'His work in this exhibition is of the older French tradition, quiet, unaffected and without any swagger of brushwork.’
By the end of the century Daplyn was regularly writing 'Art Notes’ for several publications, most notably the Sydney Morning Herald and the short-lived Australasian Art Review . In 1900 his painting The moon is up, yet tis not night was purchased by the (then National) Art Gallery of NSW. This was the only work by Daplyn purchased by the NSW state collection; the oil was de-accessioned in 1946.
In 1902 Daplyn published the first edition of Landscape painting from nature in Australia: a manual for the student in oil and water colours . Written as an introduction to landscape painting, the book was illustrated with examples by Daplyn and the Art Society President, William Lister Lister. Reflecting the popularity of landscape painting at the time, the first edition had a print run of 2,000 copies, and the work was republished in 1909, 1914 and 1923.
Daplyn was a keen Francophile and enjoyed visiting the Parisian galleries and painting the French countryside. When living in Sydney he maintained his love of France by frequenting the Café Francais where he, along with several other artists, were known as 'The Growlers’.
In early 1913 Daplyn left Sydney for a visit to Europe. The Salon (Vol 1, No 4, 1913, p 235) reported that he received a commission from the Royal Art Society to 'enquire as to the most up-to-date methods of teaching art’. While in Europe Daplyn wrote several articles on British and French art which were published in the Sydney Morning Herald . According to The Bulletin (5 Aug 1926) he received a 'substantial legacy’ around this time, so it can be assumed that this research tour was self-funded. Daplyn was listed as living at 35 Mall Road, Hammersmith, London, from 1914 until 1919. Despite living in England he continued to submit work to several RAS shows.
After the Great War he returned to Sydney, and in the 1923 edition of his landscape manuel Daplyn was listed as an 'art expert’ living at 50 Young Street, Sydney – 'pictures on view at moderate prices’.
At an August 1923 meeting in Sydney, Daplyn, along with prominent Sydney based watercolourists B.E. Minns, Martin Stainforth, C.E.S. Tindall, J.H. Bennett and A.H. Fullwood, established the Australian Watercolour Institute (AWI). Daplyn was elected Hon. Secretary and Treasurer, and at the AWI’s first exhibition in March/April 1924 he exhibited four English themed watercolours.
While notable in the development of landscape art in Australia, Daplyn is best remembered as a teacher and advocate of plein air painting. By 1924 he had returned to London. He died in Chelsea, aged 82, on 19 July 1926. He never married and had no children. The then President of the RAS, William Lister Lister, was a close friend and became a beneficiary in Daplyn’s will, receiving all of his pictures and books.
- Writers:
- Silas Clifford-Smith
- Date written:
- 2010
- Last updated:
- 2011
