William Beckwith McInnes

William Beckwith (Bill) McInnes (1889–1939), artist, was only fourteen when he began studying drawing under Frederick McCubbin at the National Gallery School in Melbourne, before moving to painting. In 1912 he travelled around Europe and the UK, and his landscapes were exhibited at the Royal Institute of Oil Painters in London in 1913. Back in Melbourne he held successful exhibitions and taught drawing at the National Gallery School from 1916 to 1934. Beginning in 1921, McInnes won the Archibald Prize seven times, writing in defence of his conservative work that 'in Australia we have not been bitten by Cubism or Futurism or other isms … and I am glad of it'. Sir William Dargie was the only artist to win more times than McInnes; Dargie employed a style similar to McInnes, of optical realism based on tonal values, which had been handed down from Bernard Hall, McInnes' teacher, via Max Meldrum to Archibald Colquhoun, Dargie's teacher. In 1927 McInnes was commissioned, with Septimus Power, to paint the opening of Federal Parliament by HRH the Duke of York. He went to London in 1933 to paint the Duke's portrait. The following year he acted as director of the National Gallery of Victoria, and became Head of the National Gallery School, a position he held until shortly before his death.

Purchased 1999