Australie

rif. 130007 — May's series was unpublished but dates from circa 1890; it was based on original sketches by Gill and Hamilton five each from upwards of fifty years earlier. May's ten plates were printed in brown ink on light brown arch-topped backgrounds printed surface 150 × 205 mm on uniform sheets of cream paper 200 × 275 mm; they were not coloured. Gill's titles are 'Cradling Forest Creek 1852' 'The Claim Disputed' 'Mustering Cattle' 'Native Sneaking Emus' and 'The Bushranger Pursued'. Hamilton's titles in which the horse naturally enough features prominently are 'The Lost Bushman' 'The Found Bushman' 'Bushmen in Danger' 'Australian Bushmen' and 'The Bushman'. Offered here is one print after Gill 'The Bushranger Pursued' and one after Hamilton 'The Bushman'. The invaluable 'Dictionary of Australian Artists. Painters Sketchers Photographers and Engravers to 1870' edited by Joan Kerr has only this to say: 'MAY E.C. lithographer signed nine lithographs celebrating life in the bush and on the goldfields c.1855-60 ML. He may have been the May who was in partnership with George Walker q.v. at Melbourne in the early 1870s'. At least he appears on their radar . We have established the following facts. Edgar Charles May 1867-1920 was born at North Adelaide on 27 May 1867; his name later appeared in the local Sands and McDougall's directories with his occupation listed as artist. One published example of his work not noted at all by Kerr and not attributed to May by Ferguson is '14 Views of Old Adelaide from Sketches in 1840-1849 by S.T. Gill F.R. Nixon S. Calvert and O. Korn' Adelaide E.S. Wigg 1890; oblong quarto 19 leaves all rectos blank comprising the gilt-pictorial title page signed in the image by E.C. May 14 full-page tinted lithographic views with tissue-guards the 3-page list of 181 subscribers and the key to plate 5 between plates 4 and 5'. This is Ferguson 9924e which is essentially the same item as Ferguson 9807 apart from the different publishers. We have inspected numerous copies of 9924e the Wigg version and the odd Galbraith one and it is clear that the original Galbraith imprint is masked by the gold blocking carrying the later Wigg imprint. The nature of the contents reworked material from well-known earlier artists the medium tinted lithographs printed in brown and the style of the work leave us in no doubt that May is responsible for all the material in '14 Views of Old Adelaide'. We suggest that the full series of ten lithographs was prepared by him with the intention of putting out a companion volume to '14 Views of Old Adelaide'. The change of publisher after that book was printed leads us also to suggest that Galbraith or May or both lost money on the venture and who knows perhaps the Wigg issue was not a commercial success either. In any event one could see how enthusiasm for a sequel might be considerably diminished. Complete sets of these plates are exceptionally rare on the open market even Kerr's dictionary refers to only nine of them; until now they have been poorly documented in the literature. Individual plates are rarely offered for sale either. These two uniformly matted framed and glazed have been professionally hand-coloured at a later date but probably five decades or more ago which serves to present May's work to best advantage. 2 items. unknown