Julian Rossi Ashton was an English-born Australian artist and teacher. He is best known for founding the Julian Ashton Art School in Sydney and encouraging Australian painters to capture local life and scenery en plein air, greatly influencing the impressionist Heidelberg School movement.
Portrait of Ashton by George Washington Lambert, 1928, Art Gallery of New South Wales
Ashton's Evening, Merri Creek (1882), held at the Art Gallery of New South Wales, was claimed by the artist to be the first true plein air landscape painted in Australia.
Julian Ashton Art School building, George Street, The Rocks
Photograph by Henry King showing members of the Society of Artists in 1907, including Ashton (far left) and Norman Lindsay (fifth from left)
The Heidelberg School was an Australian art movement of the late 19th century. It has been described as Australian impressionism.
Arthur Streeton, Golden Summer, Eaglemont, 1889
Tom Roberts, Shearing the Rams, 1890
Buxton's Rooms, Swanston Street, site of the 9 by 5 Impression Exhibition
The 9 by 5 catalogue, designed by Conder, shows a female as an allegory of art being unraveled from the bandages of 'Convention'. The exhibition's theme of transience is also symbolised by falling blossoms and a dragonfly, which in folklore lives only one day.
