Hilda Rix Nicholas

Last week I have discovered a wonderful Australian artist who was born in 1884 as Emily Hilda Rix. She grew up in a creative household in South Yarra, Melbourne. Her father Henry Finch Rix was a mathematician, Inspector with the Victorian Education Department and a poet who wrote dramatic verses in support of Federation. Her mother was a local artist with her own studio in Flinders Street; she was also a committee member of the Austral Salon, a meeting place for intellectual women interested in the fine arts.

Hilda studied at the National Gallery of Victoria Art School under Frederick McCubbin and later in London and Paris. She travelled between Europe and North Africa creating wonderful works of art along the way.

Many of Hilda's works went into private collections for which records are limited. Many were burned in a fire at the family property after her death in the 1960s. Here are some examples of her work.