New Zealand Illustrated by E. Wakefield

Cover of New Zealand Illustrated

This book of sixteen chromolithographic views is more commonly known as "Potts and Willis", to distinguish it from the E . J . Wakefield work,  Illustrations to Adventure in New Zealand [The two Edward Wakefields were cousins.]

New Zealand Illustrated was issued in 1890, though the title page is dated 1889, and was thus the second major chromolithographic book to be printed in New Zealand (the first was Featon's Art Album of New Zealand Flora, 1889). The edition size is not known, though the book was sold at only one guinea a copy, which would seem to indicate a large printing: the book is today very scarce in its complete form. It was published by the well-known and important firm of A . D. Willis, Wanganui, which had been established by a printer who later extended his business by buying out the bookselling and stationery business of W. Hutchison.

Archibald Duddington Willis was born in England in 1842 and arrived in New Zealand in 1857. Trained as a commercial printer, his first business venture in New Zealand was the founding of the Hawkes Bay Herald immediately after his arrival. After the discovery of gold, he left to try his luck on the diggings, but had little success. He moved to Wanganui in 1867, where, in partnership with the Hon.  J. Ballance he managed the Wanganui Herald.

In public life, A. D. Willis became a member of the Borough Council, some-time Chairman of the Harbour Board, and was Member for Wanganui in the House of Representatives from 1893-1896.

Potts, William, 1859-1947. Potts, William 1859-1947 : City of Wellington, N.Z. 1885.
W. Potts, del. Wanganui; A.D. Willis [1885].. Ref: C-060-005.
Alexander Turnbull Library, Wellington, New Zealand. /records/23224811

The firm of A. D. Willis specialised in chromolithographic printing, particularly Christmas cards, booklets, and programmes, though it also had the distinction of being the only manufacturer of playing cards in the Southern Hemisphere. At the 1885 Wellington Industrial Exhibition A. D. Willis received the first prize and Silver Medal for chromolithographic printing. Dr T. M. Hocken, visiting Wanganui in April 1889 in connection with the organising of the New Zealand and South Seas Exhibition, made a point of calling to see the printery, and "expressed himself both surprised and pleased . . . at the perfection of Mr Willis' plant and apparatus for lithographic printing." This may have been at the time New Zealand Illustrated was in production.

The man whose name is always associated with Willis, William Potts, was an English lithographer whom Willis brought to New Zealand about 1881, and who remained in his employ for almost twenty years. Known to his fellow workers as "Billy" Potts, he was a quiet and reserved bachelor who lived in a succession of lodgings, and took no part in community affairs. Some of the lithographic stones on which Potts worked for New Zealand Illustrated eventually became paving stones in his employer's garden. Potts lithographed one painting and the photographs of several artists for the views in New Zealand Illustrated, and brief biographical notes on these artists are given below.

The large folding plate of the Tarawera Eruption was taken from a painting by Charles Blomfield, who was a friend of A. D . Willis. Blomfield (1848-1926) had arrived in New Zealand in 1863. A self-taught artist, he painted directly from nature, but frequently made copies of his own work, and maintained himself as a professional painter by selling his works to tourists as souvenirs. Blomfield exhibited frequently throughout New Zealand, and also overseas: at the 1887 Indian and Colonial Exhibition in London he had the distinction of having every picture he entered sold.

Potts, William, 1859-1947. Willis, Archibald Duddington (Firm) :White Terrace, Rotomahana, N.Z.
W. Potts lith; C. Spencer, photo. Wanganui; A.D. Willis [1889].
Ref: B-080-015-a. Alexander Turnbull Library, Wellington, New Zealand. /records/23197732

Samuel Carnell, b.1832, trained as a mechanic in a lace factory, but turned his attention to photography. He came to Auckland in 1862, and worked for Crombie and Webster, photographers. Tempted by the goldfields, he set up small photographic businesses in Hokitika and in Nelson, where he remained only six months before returning to Auckland, which he left for Napier in 1869. His business there prospered, and he settled and became active in community affairs until his retirement in 1905. He was the Member for Napier in the House of Representatives from 1893-1896, and was Mayor of Napier in 1904.

Wrigglesworth and Binns was begun in 1863 by J. D. Wrigglesworth, who took in F. C. Binns as partner in 1874. Their photographic business specialised in portraiture, and they patented their own method of photo finishing. Two First Awards for Photography were won by the firm in 1879 at the Sydney Exhibition and 1881 in Melbourne, and at the 1885 New Zealand Exhibition in Wellington they won the only award made for portraiture.

William Andrews Collis was born in Suva in 1853, and was brought as an infant to Auckland. Educated at the Wesley College, he moved with his family to New Plymouth in 1872, and three years later set up in business as a photographer. Within seven years he had built his own studios, which specialised in portraiture and landscape photography.

William Tyree was also a photographer, who established his business in Nelson in 1878. His photographic collection which is a most valuable record of the development of Nelson city and province, is now in the Alexander Turnbull Library.

James Ring, a Londoner, had trained as an artist and had spent some time in Boston before coming to New Zealand in 1879. He had hoped to settle in Wellington, but ill-health drove him to Greymouth, where he established a successful photographic business in 1880.

John Robert Hanna was an Irish photographer who arrived in New Zealand in 1867. He began in the employ of R. H. Bartlett of Auckland, but soon established the firm of Hemus and Hanna, of which he was manager. This partnership was dissolved in 1885, and Hanna took over the business of Crombie. He won several prizes for photography in Wellington and London.

New Zealand Illustrated was reproduced in facsimile in an edition of 1000 copies by the Salem Publishing Company, Wellington, in 1967 and several plates were also reproduced by Avon Fine Prints during the 1970s so it can sometimes be hard to tell if a second hand print at auction is a genuine antique print from 1890 or a later reproduction.

Dumont D'Urville's artists & their prints of NZ

 Early NZ lithograph "L'Astrolabe in French Pass" 

Within the range of early New Zealand prints, there are no better or more significant French prints than those published after two voyages of L'Astrolabe under the command of Dumont D'Urville. His records are as important in their way as Cook's, and the prints published in the Atlas to each voyage are among the finest New Zealand prints.

Published at a time when French lithography was at its peak, they are superb examples of both artistic and accurate recording and the highest technical proficiency in drawing on stone. Originally published in black-and-white, many plates are now found hand-coloured, and it is believed some volumes were coloured for the publisher.

Dumont D'Urville was an extraordinarily talented man, with a wide range of interests. He had entered the French Navy in 1807 as a midshipman, and passed his examinations in navigation and mathematics to gain first place among 72 successful candidates. Simultaneously, for his own interest, he was studying Greek, Latin, and Hebrew, to which he would later add Spanish and Italian. His other great love was botany, and after an application to join Freycinet on Uranie was unsuccessful, he spent all available time studying botany and amassing a very large and important collection of plants.

In 1820 Dumont D'Urville sailed on his first voyage, a nine-month cruise in the eastern Mediterranean and the Black Sea as an assistant in hydrographical research. He was present at Melos when the Venus de Milo was discovered, and it was through his influence that the statue was purchased for the Louvre.

The following year, promoted to Lieutenant, Dumont D'Urville at last set sail for the Pacific, with Duperrey aboard Coquille. The events of the period of almost three years that Coquille was away from France left a profound impression on Dumont D'Urville, and he could scarcely wait for his next chance to go to the South Seas. In addition to his duties as executive officer, he had been responsible for the zoological and botanical records, and later published accounts on these subjects earned him high praise.

L'Astrolabe: First Voyage, 1826-1829
Promoted to the rank of Commander in November, 1825, and commissioned to Coquille the following month, Dumont D'Urville began the long preparations for his own great scientific voyage. His instructions were to sail via the Canary Islands, round Cape Horn, to visit Australia and New Zealand before exploring further in the South Pacific, and to return to France via the Indian Ocean and the Cape of Good Hope. Even the dates for the various stages of the voyage were prescribed, though they were to prove very difficult to maintain.

Coquille was renamed L'Astrolabe for the voyage, and sailed in April 1826. Among those aboard were Lesson, the botanist, Barthelemy Lauvergne, Dumont D'Urville's secretary, whose artistic talent was pressed into service to record many zoological specimens; and young Louis Auguste de Sainson, the expedition's official artist, who was later to become a permanent clerk to the Admiralty.

L'Astrolabe spent almost three months on the New Zealand coast, moving from the north of the South Island up the entire east coast of the North Island. The expedition members were tireless in their recording: a report published after their return to Paris states (of the whole cruise): "There are a great many drawings designed to show the character of places, the types of men living in them, their costumes, arms, dwellings, etc.: eight hundred and sixty in all. We owe them to M.de Sainson.  If. . . we add four hundred views of the coast drawn by M. Lauvergne, the total number . . . will reach twelve hundred and sixty-six . . . [there is also a] fine collection of portraits of the natives which comprises one hundred and fifty-three figures . . . this collection calls for special attention . . ."

From New Zealand L'Astrolabe went to New Guinea and in February 1828 to Vanikoro, where the remains of La Perouse's ships were definitely identified. L'Astrolabe returned to France in March 1829.

Dumont D'Urville's pride and pleasure in the accomplishments of his expedition turned to dismay and bitterness when the Admiralty refused any recognition of the work of his officers and men: indeed, he charged the Admiralty with "indifference" and could not accept their lack of interest and support.

Over the next four years Dumont D'Urville himself wrote the entire text of the five volumes of narrative of the voyage of L'Astrolabe, and in 1835 saw the completion of publication of the whole account — twelve volumes of text and five albums. The Atlas included 32 superb New Zealand views.

L'Astrolabe: Second Voyage, 1837-1840
Dumont D'Urville's third Pacific voyage began in September 1837 when L'Astrolabe, in company La Zelee, sailed from Toulon. He was 47 years old, and the new expedition was both hazardous and arduous: these ships were to explore the South Polar region.

Print of Stars & Stripes flying over Russell in 1840

with

L'Astrolabe and La Zelee spent the months from January to March 1838 exploring in the Antarctic, discovering and naming Louis Philippe Land in honour of the King, and drawing many maps and charts which were forwarded from Valparaiso in May. The period to December 1839 was spent among the Pacific islands, but in January 1840, Dumont D'Urville took his ships south again into the ice, and the names of Adelie Land (for his wife) and the Clarie Coast (for the wife of Captain Jacquinot of La Zelee) were among those added to the polar maps.

From March to May 1840 Dumont D'Urville revisited New Zealand, approaching from the south and passing Stewart Island before again sailing up the east coast. The artist on this occasion was Louis Le Breton, a surgeon and naturalist, and gifted painter who was later to exhibit at the Paris Salon.

L'Astrolabe and La Zelee returned to Toulon in November 1840, and this time Dumont D'Urville had no cause to complain of "indifference". He was awarded the Gold Medal of the Geographical Society, and was promoted to Rear-Admiral, while his officers and men received awards from the King.

For the next two years Dumont D'Urville worked on the preparation and publication of the account of the voyage, and two volumes had appeared when, in May 1842, he, his wife, and their only child, were burned to death in a disastrous train wreck. The third volume of Voyage au Pole Sud was written by the expedition's geographer, Vincendon-Dumoulin. One of the prints included in this volume was “Entry to the Bay of Islands New Zealand” that has been republished by Thorndon Fine Prints. This shows the American flag of the time flying from the flagstaff later made famous by Hone Heke on Flagstaff Hill near Russell and is now available for sale online here.

Early Prints of Maori Life : John Gilfillan's remarkable "Interior of a Native Village"

Part of an occasional series of articles on prints from our collection.  This week we look at the tragic life of the artist John Gilfillan whose depiction of a pa on the Wanganui River "Interior of a Native Village" is both a remarkable portrait of Maori life in the early days of colonisation and one of NZ's rarest prints.

About the artist

John Alexander Gilfillan, the son of a Captain of the 78th Highland Regiment, was born in 1793. He ran away to sea at an early age, but later retired from the navy to study art.  Gilfillan's qualifications gained him the position of Drawing and Painting Master at the Andersonian University, a position which he held for fifteen years. In 1826 he married Miss Sarah Murray, by whom he had four children. She died in 1837, and shortly afterwards he married his cousin, Mary Bridges, and moved with his family to London, where he spent three months studying carpentry and engineering in preparation for emigrating to New Zealand.

Gilfillan's Farm at Mataraua

The family arrived in New Zealand on Christmas Day 1841 (Gilfillan's 47th birthday) and went immediately to Petre (Wanganui). They took up land at Matarawa (Mataraua), and built a house on their town section, living there till 1845 when they moved finally to the farm. This house was illustrated from a sketch by Gilfillan in W. Tyrone Power's Sketches in New Zealand.

The murder of Gilfillan's wife and three of his children on 18th April 1847 caused him to abandon his farm, and at the end of the year he moved with his remaining children to Sydney. During the fifteen months he lived there he painted the Interior of a Native Village. The Pa is reputed to be Putiki-whara-nui on the Wanganui River.

Gilfillan moved to Adelaide in 1849, but in 1852 was tempted to the goldfields, and afterwards went to Melbourne. He exhibited paintings at the 1854 Exhibition, and died in Melbourne in 1863.

Printing of the Lithograph

Interior of a Native Village (Lithograph)

The authors of Early Prints of New Zealand were indebted to L.A.L. Moore, Esq., of Wellington for the following account of the circumstances surrounding the printing of the lithograph of Interior of a Native Village.

Mr Moore's grandfather, Captain Frederick George Moore, was in the merchant marine, and arrived in Wellington in February 1840 aboard the Bengal Merchant. He purchased the brigantine Jewess and began trading round the New Zealand coast. He acted as pilot for Wakefield's ships the Will Watch, Whitby, and Arrow when they sailed into Nelson Haven to establish the second New Zealand Company settlement, and himself settled on property at Motueka and in Nelson.

Moore probably first met Gilfillan in Wanganui during a trading visit, but met him again in Sydney in 1848 when he (Moore) was on a return trip to England. Gilfillan gave the painting of Interior of a Native Village to Moore, who took it to London, and on arrival arranged an interview with Prince Albert to see if the painting could be displayed at the Royal art gallery. The picture was inspected by both Prince Albert and the Duke of Wellington, and it was decided that it should be shown at the 1851 Exhibition at the Crystal Palace.

Captain Moore was in charge of the New Zealand Court at the Exhibition, and the picture was among the items included. Moore had 50 copies lithographed, sending 25 to Sir George Grey for distribution, and selling and presenting the remainder to friends and associates in London. After the Exhibition, Moore gave the original painting to his sister in Paris: all trace has been lost since the 1870 Franco-Prussian War and it is possible the picture was destroyed at that time."

It is interesting to note that all known copies of the lithograph bear the word "Proof”.  Moore may have perhaps intended to issue the lithograph in larger numbers once the initial fifty were distributed. A census of copies would be interesting today: if in fact only 50 copies were printed, natural wear and loss would reduce the quantity to a handful, making the Interior of a Native Village one of the more rare New Zealand prints.

Full Catalogue Description of the print from Early Prints of New Zealand

Interior of a native village or "Pa", in New Zealand,/situated near the town of Petre, at Wanganui, one of the New Zealand Company's settlements in Cook's Straits, Northern Island,/the figures in the foreground are all portraits, and the original picture (now in London) was painted on the spot./ . . . F.G. Moore, Late of New Zealand, now of 30 Arundel Street Strand. J.A. Gilfillan, M.A. pinxt. — E. Walker, lithr. Day & Son, lithrs. to the Queen. The original picture in the possession of F.G. Moore, 30 Arundel St. Strand. "Proof [1852?] 48.1 x 63.8cm
lithograph in colour, handfinished.

[The print was reproduced by Avon Fine Prints Ltd, Christchurch, 1969 in an edition limited to 1000 copies, NZ Fine Prints have a handful of prints from this later edition available for purchase].

Story of a print of New Plymouth that appeared in the British Parliamentary Papers

Gully, John 1819-1888 :New Plymouth, New Zealand. [London] Day & Son [1860].
Ref: B-051-015. Alexander Turnbull Library, Wellington, New Zealand. http://natlib.govt.nz/records/22326669

This rare print is the only New Zealand view to appear in a British Parliamentary paper in the period up to 1875 (the period covered by Ellis "Early Prints of New Zealand").  It was re-printed by Avon Fine Prints in the 1960s and the original watercolour that the print is based on by painter John Gully is in the National Archives.

The print accompanied a despatch from Governor Gore Browne dated 13 March 1860 and appears in Command paper 2798, 1861: "Papers relating to the recent disturbance in New Zealand."

The description of New Plymouth which accompanies the view is not particularly complimentary about the new settlement.

"The town consists of a struggling village on a skirt of flat land, which is enclosed and commanded by a higher table land encircling the town in the form of a crescent. One end of this crescent is Marsland  Hill, on which the barrack stands, and on the other extreme we are about to erect a stockade. The intervening space between the barrack and this block-house is about three quarters of a mile, but the ground is broken by ravines and swamps and covered with fern, so that what is delineated in the New Zealand Company's plan as squares and streets is in reality wild land, much tormented, and well adapted to cover and conceal the approach of an enemy. Isolated cottages dotted about at intervals, the town being confined to little more than a single street on the shore.

The inland country generally is covered with high fern and dense forest, some of which is almost impenetrable to Europeans, and is everywhere broken by ravines and streams which are thrown off Mount Egmont [Taranaki]. There is a native pah in New Plymouth . . . and there are numerous pahs in every direction . . . 

The proposed blockhouses, which look so imposing in the sketch, may be described as wooden guard-houses, large enough to contain twenty men each. They are not yet constructed."

The view was redrawn for Sir James Alexander's Incidents of the Maori War, 1863

Mr John Gully
The Nelson Provincial Museum, Davis Collection: 1138

John Gully was a major New Zealand artist - according to Una Platts "Nineteenth Century NZ Artists" probably the most popular of his time.  Gully was born in Bath, England. He was apprenticed to an iron foundry and graduated next to the designing and drafting department. However this did not satisfy the young Gully's ambition and he spent periods as clerk in a savings bank and worked in his father's business. Gully took private lessons in painting during this time. In 1852 he and his wife and children emigrated on the John Phillips to New Plymouth.

In 1858 "J.G. of Omata" was advertising ready to paint "views" of properties for sending overseas. He farmed at Omata and worked as a clerk in New Plymouth. Gully took part as a volunteer in the Taranaki wars but was invalided out of the Army. In 1860 Gully and his family moved to Nelson where he settled permanently.  Gully was Drawing Master at Nelson College, then draughtsman in the Lands & Survey Office.

In 1863 two of his paintings, one a wreck of the Lord Worsley, one a view of Mount Egmont were advertised for sale. The encouragement given him by von Haast, whose "outlines" of mountains he coloured, and by the painter J. C. Richmond, then Commissioner of Crown Lands, was probably the turning point of his career. Richmond went on painting expeditions with him and used all his influence to make Gully's work known. In 1865 Richmond enlisted the help of his brother, C. W. Richmond, then a judge in Dunedin, to get his own and Gully's work to the NZ Exhibition and to see that people knew that Gully was ready to paint professionally.

By 1870 Gully was probably the most popular painter in the New Zealand. He exhibited watercolours at the Intercolonial Ex Melbourne 1866-67. In 1878 retired from the Lands & Survey Office and began to spend his full time painting and was listed as a Nelson artist in Wise's directory.  John Gully nearly always in watercolour and was greatly praised for his ''atmospheric effects". In the NZ and South Seas Ex Dunedin 1889-90, a group of watercolours by the "late Mr Gully" were shown as a special exhibit. Exhibited: Fine Arts Association Wellington 1883, NZ Academy of Fine Arts 1889, Melbourne International Ex 1880-81, Centennial Ex, Melbourne 1888-89.  Paintings included in Centennial Exhibition in Wellington1940. Represented extensively in Nelson's Bishop Suter art gallery, and Gully's paintings are in most gallery and library collections throughout NZ today.