{{Short description|Australian artist (1882–1968)}} {{Use Australian English|date=June 2020}} {{Use dmy dates|date=August 2019}} {{Infobox artist | name = Vida Lahey | honorific_prefix = | image = StateLibQld 1 109636 Artist Vida Lahey, ca. 1924.jpg | caption = Vida Lahey in Queensland, {{circa|1924}} | birth_name = Frances Vida Lahey | birth_date = {{birth date|1882|08|26|df=y}} | birth_place = Pimpama, Queensland, Australia | death_date = {{death date and age|1968|08|29|1882|08|26|df=y}} | death_place = Wonga Wallen, St Lucia, Queensland, Australia | resting_place = St Lucia, Queensland | field = still life; landscape; portrait; art education | training = Brisbane Central Technical College and National Gallery School, Melbourne | movement = | works = Canungra, c.1930<br/>Wonga Wallen c.1940<br/>Bedroom at St. Lucia with Dobell Portrait c.1961<br/>Monday Morning in Queensland Art Gallery | spouse = | patrons = | awards = Society of Arts (NSW) Medal, 1945<br/>Coronation Medal, 1953<br/>MBE, 1958 }}
'''Frances Vida Lahey''' MBE (/vaɪdə leɪiː/ ''VEYE-də LAY-ee;''<ref name=":1"/> 26 August 1882 – 29 August 1968) was a prominent artist in Queensland, Australia. She exhibited widely from 1902 until 1965.
==Early life== Frances Vida Lahey was born on 26 August 1882 at Pimpama, Queensland, the daughter of Irish-born farmer David Lahey and his wife Jane Jemima (née Walmsley).<ref name="adb" /> She had eleven siblings including conservationist Romeo Lahey.<ref>{{Cite web |date=17 December 2020 |title=The Lahey family |url=https://www.awm.gov.au/learn/memorial-boxes/1/case-studies/lahey |access-date=2024-07-24 |website=Australian War Memorial}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |last=Hunter |first=Claire |date=8 February 2019 |title=After the war |url=https://www.awm.gov.au/articles/blog/about/articles/after-the-war-rejoicing-and-remembrance |access-date=24 July 2024 |website=Australian War Memorial}}</ref> She attended Goytelea School at Southport, and later studied painting at the Brisbane Technical College under Godfrey Rivers.<ref name="adb" /> Her uncle financed a trip to New Zealand in 1902 which inspired some of her earliest exhibited works, as well as helping to set her up to study in Melbourne.<ref name=":0">{{Cite journal|last=Lovell|first=Susan|date=2008|title='Wanted, a strong girl, able to milk and make herself agreeable': A Eudaimonistic Model for Femininity in the Art of Vida Lahey (1882-1968 )|url=https://research-repository.griffith.edu.au/bitstream/handle/10072/22869/51150_1.pdf;jsessionid=D5C9A1CF9F48D8BF2A583C5AFD0E6DE6?sequence=1|journal=Australian Feminist Studies|volume=23|issue=56|pages=195–211|doi=10.1080/08164640802020576|hdl=10072/22869|s2cid=141831506|hdl-access=free}}</ref> She studied at the National Gallery School, Melbourne under Bernard Hall and Frederick McCubbin in 1905 and again in 1909.<ref name=adb>{{cite book|last=Maynard|first=Margaret|chapter=Lahey, Frances Vida (1882–1968)|url=https://adb.anu.edu.au/biography/lahey-frances-vida-7008|title=Australian Dictionary of Biography|publisher=National Centre for Biography, Australian National University|access-date=25 November 2014|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20141225151645/http://adb.anu.edu.au/biography/lahey-frances-vida-7008|archive-date=25 December 2014|url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |date=13 December 2020 |title=Vida Lahey b. 1882 |url=https://www.daao.org.au/bio/vida-lahey/biography/ |access-date=24 July 2024 |website=Design & Art Australia Online (DAAO)}}</ref>
During World War I, she travelled to London to be in proximity to her brothers and cousins who were serving with the AIF, as well as to study art when she could.<ref name=":1">{{Cite interview |last=Lahey |first=Vida |interviewer=Hazel de Berg |title=Vida Lahey interviewed by Hazel de Berg in the Hazel de Berg collection [sound recording]. |url=https://nla.gov.au/nla.obj-214438572/listen?searchTerm=vida%20lahey |publisher=National Library of Australia |date=26 November 1965}}</ref><ref name=":0" /> She assisted with the volunteer war effort. Following the War, she studied with Frances Hodgkins, in the Colarossi in Paris and in Italy before returning to Australia in 1921.<ref>{{Cite news|url=http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article22609266|title=A Returned Queensland Artist.|date=1921-02-19|work=Queenslander (Brisbane, Qld. : 1866 - 1939)|access-date=2020-01-06|pages=6}}</ref>
==Career== thumb|Watercolour painting by Vida Lahey featuring Brisbane City Hall as seen from Albert Park with the Albert Street Methodist Church steeple to the left (1936) Vida Lahey was one of the first female artists in Queensland and Australia, who regarded themselves as professionals and who sought to earn a living from practising their art. Lahey pioneered art classes for both children and adults in Queensland; and she and Daphne Mayo were responsible for the foundation of the Queensland Art Fund in 1929, which helped to establish an art library and acquire works of art for the state. She travelled to Europe in 1927 for further opportunities to study art.<ref name=":0" /> In 1937 Lahey became a foundation member of, and exhibited with, Robert Menzies' anti-modernist organisation, the Australian Academy of Art.<ref>{{Cite book |url=https://nla.gov.au/nla.obj-323428163 |title=Australian Academy of Art First Exhibition, April 8th-29th, Sydney : Catalogue |publisher=Australian Academy of Art |year=1938 |edition=1st |location=Sydney |language=en |access-date=2022-11-02}}</ref> Lahey was awarded the Society of Artists (NSW) Medal in 1945, in appreciation of good services for the advancement of Australian art, the Coronation Medal in 1953 and in 1958 honoured with an MBE for services to art.<ref name="adb" />
Lahey was a long-term active member of the Royal Queensland Art Society (known up to 1926 as the Queensland Art Society) and served on its committee for several years.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Bradbury |first=Keith |title=Thorns & Petals, 100 years of the Royal Queensland Art Society |last2=Cooke |first2=Glenn R. |date= |year=1988 |isbn=0-7316-3596-5 |pages=200–201}}</ref>
==Later life== Vida Lahey's house Wonga Wallen was originally built for her brother Romeo Lahey in Canungra, on a spur of the Darlington Range and was completed in 1920. Later the house was moved from the outskirts to the Canungra township on the hill above the present Catholic Church and occupied by her parents David and Jane Jemima Lahey, and then moved again by Vida and her sister Jayne Lahey in 1946 to its present block in Sir Fred Schonell Drive, St Lucia in Brisbane.<ref name="qhr">{{cite QHR|15091|Vida and Jayne Lahey's House|600316|access-date=1 August 2014}}</ref>
Lahey remained at Wonga Wallen in St Lucia until her death on 29 August 1968 and was cremated. Wonga Wallen was transferred to the sole ownership of her sister Jayne who remained there until a few years before her death in 1982 during which time another sister, Mavis Denholm (''née'' Lahey), lived in the house. The house was listed on the Queensland Heritage Register on 21 October 1992.<ref name=qhr/><ref name=adb/>
==Works==
thumb|left|A bowl of flowers, watercolour by Vida Lahey (1939)
Lahey is widely known for her oil paintings, particularly her 1912 painting ''Monday morning'' which depicts the Lahey family home. The painting launched her career upon its exhibition at the Queensland Art Society's annual exhibition.<ref>{{Cite web |last=Young |first=Jacklyn |date=30 Sep 2022 |title=Vida Lahey: Queensland's art advocate |url=https://blog.qagoma.qld.gov.au/vida-lahey-queensland-art-advocate/ |access-date=24 July 2024 |website=QAGOMA}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |title=Vida Lahey: Monday morning 1912 |url=https://learning.qagoma.qld.gov.au/artworks/monday-morning/ |access-date=24 July 2024 |website=QAGOMA}}</ref><ref name=":1"/>
Lahey is known to have painted at least two paintings of Wonga Wallen, Canungra in the late 1930s and Wonga Wallen Loggia at Canungra in the 1940s both in the collection of Ms Shirley Lahey. Another painting, Bedroom at St Lucia with Dobell portrait, c.1961, was painted by Vida in her St Lucia bedroom.<ref name="qhr" />
== Collections == Vida Lahey is represented in major Australian art galleries, including the National Gallery of Australia.<ref>Her works held by the National Gallery:
* {{Cite web |title=Coolangatta, Kirra Beach, from Tweed Heads |url=https://searchthecollection.nga.gov.au/object/199046 |access-date=2024-07-24 |website=National Gallery of Australia |language=en}} * {{Cite web |title=The zinc works, Risdon |url=https://searchthecollection.nga.gov.au/object/219900 |access-date=2024-07-24 |website=National Gallery of Australia |language=en}} * {{Cite web |title=Customs House and St John's Cathedral, Brisbane, from Kangaroo Point |url=https://searchthecollection.nga.gov.au/object/264251 |access-date=2024-07-24 |website=National Gallery of Australia |language=en}} * {{Cite web |title=From the wharves, Hobart |url=https://searchthecollection.nga.gov.au/object/685 |access-date=2024-07-24 |website=National Gallery of Australia |language=en}} </ref> Her painting ''Monday Morning'' is part of the Queensland Art Gallery's collection.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Monday morning - Vida Lahey |url=https://learning.qagoma.qld.gov.au/artworks/monday-morning/ |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190325120455/https://learning.qagoma.qld.gov.au/artworks/monday-morning/ |archive-date=25 March 2019 |access-date=2020-01-06 |website=QAGOMA Learning |publisher=Queensland Art Gallery of Modern}}</ref>
== Exhibitions ==
* ''Songs of Colour: The Art of Vida Lahey'', Queensland Art Gallery, Brisbane, 1989.<ref>{{Cite book|last=MacAulay|first=Bettiina|title=Songs of Colour: The Art of Vida Lahey|publisher=Queensland Art Gallery|year=1989|isbn=0724233067|location=QAGOMA Research Library, Brisbane}}</ref> * ''Know My Name: Australian Women Artists 1900 to Now'', National Gallery of Australia, Canberra, 2020–2021.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Know My Name |url=https://nga.gov.au/know-my-name/ |access-date=2024-07-24 |website=National Gallery of Australia |language=en}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |last= |last2= |last3= |title=Vida Lahey, 1882 — 1968 |url=https://nga.gov.au/knowmyname/artists/vida-lahey/ |access-date=2024-07-24 |website=National Gallery of Australia |language=en}}</ref>
==Oral history==
An oral history interview with Lahey, recorded in 1965, is available at the National Library of Australia.<ref>https://nla.gov.au/nla.cat-vn1945350</ref>
== References == {{Sister project auto}} {{reflist}}
=== Attribution === {{QHR-CC-2014-text}}
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Lahey, Vida}} Category:1882 births Category:1968 deaths Category:People from the Gold Coast, Queensland Category:Members of the Order of the British Empire Category:Articles incorporating text from the Queensland Heritage Register Category:20th-century Australian women artists Category:20th-century Australian artists Category:19th-century Australian women artists Category:National Gallery of Victoria Art School alumni Category:Women's Art Register artists