The wool quilt makers, 1940 – 41

Important Australian + International Fine Art
Melbourne
26 August 2026
9

Dorrit Black

(1891 - 1951)
The wool quilt makers, 1940 – 41

colour linocut on paper

23.0 x 31.0 cm (image)
27.0 x 37.5 cm (sheet)

artist’s proof

edition of 50
signed with artist’s monogram in image upper left

Estimate: 
$30,000 – $40,000
Provenance

Estate of the artist, Adelaide
Thence by descent
Helen Finlayson (née Black), Adelaide, 1951 [the artist's sister]
Margaret Michelmore (née Finlayson), Adelaide, a gift from the above
Estate of the above, Adelaide

Exhibited

Dorrit Black (Retrospective), Royal South Australian Society of Arts, Adelaide, 25 October – 3 November 1945, cat. 53 (another example)
Contemporary Group, Farmers Blaxland Galleries, Sydney, 1946, cat. 4 (another example)
Dorrit Black, Royal South Australian Society of Arts, Adelaide, 10 – 21 May 1949, cat. 55 (another example)
The Drawing, Print and Watercolour Exhibition, Contemporary Art Society of Australia, Melbourne, opened 2 December 1952, cat. 15 (another example)
Modern Australia Women: Paintings and Prints 1925 – 1945, Art Gallery of South Australia, Adelaide, 24 November 2000 – 25 February 2001, then touring to: Art Gallery of Western Australia, Perth, National Gallery of Australia, Canberra, S.H. Ervin Gallery, Sydney and Art Gallery of Ballarat, Victoria (another example)
Dorrit Black 1891 – 1951, Royal South Australian Society of Arts, Adelaide, 2011, cat. 45 (another example)
Sydney Moderns: Art for a New World, Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney, 6 July – 7 October 2013 (another example)
Dorrit Black: Unseen Forces, Art Gallery of South Australia, Adelaide, 14 June – 7 September 2014 (another example)
 

Literature

George, E., 'Woman’s Wide Range', The Mail, Adelaide, 27 October 1945, p. 7 (another example)
George, E., 'Paintings displayed by Dorrit Black', The Mail, Adelaide, 14 May 1949, p. 6 (another example)
North, I., The Art of Dorrit Black, Art Gallery of South Australia, Adelaide, and Macmillan, South Melbourne, 1979, cat. L.40, p. 133 (another example)
Rolfe, M., Patchwork Quilts in Australia, Greenhouse Publications, 1987, p. 82 (illus., another example)
Wilson, S. C., From Shadow into Light: South Australian Women Artists Since Colonisation, Delmont, South Australia, 1988, p. 97 (another example)
Hoorn, J., Strange Women: Essays in Art and Gender, Melbourne University Press, Melbourne, 1994, p. 50 (illus., another example)
Coppel, S., Lino Cuts of the Machine Age: Claude Flight and the Grosvenor School, Scholar Press, Leicester, United Kingdom, in association with National Gallery of Australia, Canberra, 1995, cat. DB42, p. 163 (illus., another example)
Hylton, J., Modern Australian Women: Paintings & Prints 1925 – 1945, Art Gallery of South Australia, Adelaide, 2000, pp. 96 (illus., another example), 97, 121
Samuel, G. & Perry, N., The Cutting Edge of Modernity: Linocuts of the Grosvenor School, Lund Humphries, London, 2002, pp. 73, 75 (illus., another example)
Speck, C., Painting Ghosts: Australian Women Artists in Wartime, Craftsman House, Melbourne, 2004, pp. 185, 186 (illus., another example)
Butler, B., Printed Images by Australian Artists 1885 – 1955, National Gallery of Australia, Canberra, 2007, p. 242 (illus., another example)
Speck, C., Beyond the Battlefield: Women Artists of the Two World Wars, Reaktion Books, London, 2014, p. 156, pl. 100 (illus., another example)
Edwards, D., and Mimmocchi, D. (eds.), Sydney Moderns: Art for a New World, Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney, 2013, pp. 179 (illus., another example), 310
Lock, T., Dorrit Black: Unseen Forces, Art Gallery of South Australia, Adelaide, 2014, p. 87 (illus.), 94 (illus.), 126, 206 (illus., another example)
Samuel, G., Cutting Edge: Modern British Printmaking, Bloomsbury, United States, 2019, pp. 73, 75 (illus.)