Edith Fenton

Edith Fenton’s name is today not all well known. She does not appear to be held by any major public collection in New Zealand – with the exception of a remarkable carved chair made collaboratively with Martha Buchanan (1862–1949) inspired by Māori carvings.
Art historian Una Platts notes that Fenton exhibited flower studies with the Auckland Society of Arts 1886-1914 and prior to that with the New Zealand Art Students Association in 1884. She also showed Fifteen Studies in Color of New Zealand Flora [sic] at the NZ and South Seas Exhibition in Dunedin, 1889–90 (an important colonial exposition which drew exhibits from across New Zealand and Australia).
She was the daughter of Francis Dart Fenton, who immigrated to New Zealand in 1850, and Martha Connell (1839–1908) whose family immigrated from Ireland in 1840 when she was one.1

The couple married at Auckland in December 1858, having four daughters and two sons. Fenton’s father rose to the position of Chief Judge of the Native Land Court before retiring to the Kaipara district from 1885 to 1895. The family appears to have socialised with the Governor William Hillier, Earl of Onslow and his wife Florence, Lady Onslow to whom Edith Fenton gifted an album of botanical watercolours. The album inscription is dated February 1891, and the Onslows were recorded as stay with the Fentons at their home at Kaipara in April 1891. 2

Edith and her family were also musical – an 1884 photograph of the Orchestra of the Auckland Choral Society includes not only Edith, but her father and brother Roger. In later life she was involved in the rehabilitation of returned servicemen, teaching convalescing soldiers basket weaving, leather work and other trades during World War I in Rotorua, for which she received an OBE. She travelled to England from New Zealand at least three times: in November 1908 (return date not found); April 1921 to January 1922 accompanying her sister and niece; and again February to December 1929 with another niece, so may well have travelled more widely. 3

1. https://teara.govt.nz/en/biographies/1f5/fenton-francis-dart
[Obituary, Martha Fenton, née Connell], “Personal Items”, NZH, 5 May 1908, 6.

2. NZH, 11 Apr 1891, 4.

3. Katrine, “Notes for Women”, NZ Times, 30 Nov 1908, 2. Leaving for England with Mrs Hope Lewis (sister), Miss Molly Egerton (presumed niece), “Table Talk”, Otago Witness, 26 April 1921, 51; Return from England, “Table Talk”, 31 Jan 1922, 47. With niece Jocelyn Wilkie to England, “Notes”, Sun, 9 Feb 1929, 20; and returning with her niece, “Table Talk”, 17 Dec 1929, 59.