BC107

Untitled

[Shipboard sketchbook]

Top spiral-bound red covered sketchbook branded Grumbacher, Artcraft All-Purpose Sketch Book, 24 spirals, 17 leaves, containing drawings of:

Cover: labelled “Grumbacher Artists' Papers 7192-2 Artcraft All-Purpose Sketch Book 6”x 9” Kid Finish 30 sheets Made in U.S.A. M. Grumbacherm Inc. New York, N.Y. 10001”

Page 1: figure, pencil, numbered LR 1, pencil

Page 1 overleaf: unknown mark

Page 2: figure, pencil

Page 2 overleaf: note “2 tents 40, shoes 30”, black crayon, numbered UR 3, pencil

Page 3: landscape, pencil, numbered LR 4, pencil

Page 3 overleaf: cat in a room, crat

Page 4: landscape, three trees, Brentwood Avenue, Mt Eden, Auckland, New Zealand, crayon, numbered LR 5, pencil

Page 4 overleaf: figure reading, crayon, numbered UR 6, pencil

Page 5: landscape, crayon, numbered LR 7, pencil

Page 5 overleaf: landscape, Suez Canal, Egypt, crayon

Page 6: landscape, crayon, numbered LR 9, pencil

Page 6 overleaf: smudges, numbered UR 10, pencil

Page 7: landscape with vehicles, crayon, numbered LR 11, pencil

Page 7 overleaf: possibly interior of a room, crayon

Page 8: head of a woman, crayon, numbered LR 13, pencil

Page 8 overleaf: landscape, Suez Canal, Egypt, crayon

Page 9: landscape, crayon, numbered LR 15, pencil

Page 9 overleaf: smudges

Page 10: landscape, crayon, numbered LL 17, pencil

Page 10 overleaf: smudges, numbered UR 18, pencil

Page 11: landscape, three trees, Brentwood Avenue, Mt Eden, Auckland, New Zealand, crayon, numbered LR 19, pencil

Page 11 overleaf: smudges

Page 12: landscape, three trees, Brentwood Avenue, Mt Eden, Auckland, New Zealand, crayon, numbered LR 13 and LL 21, pencil

Page 12 overleaf: landscape, three trees, Brentwood Avenue, Mt Eden, Auckland, New Zealand, crayon, numbered LL 22, pencil

Page 13: head of a woman, crayon, numbered LR 23, pencil

Page 13 overleaf: cat, crayon

Page 14: figure, crayon, numbered LR 25, pencil

Page 14 overleaf: two seated figures in profile, crayon, numbered LL 26, pencil

Page 15: cat, crayon, numbered LR 27, pencil

Page 15 overleaf: landscape, crayon

Page 16: cat, crayon, numbered LR 29, pencil

Page 16 overleaf: landscape, Port Said, Egypt, crayon, numbered UR 30, pencil

Page 17: ship, landscape, Piraeus, Greece, crayon

Page 17 overleaf: blank, signed “Port Piraeus Greece Flora Scales 1977”, pencil, numbered UL 31 2, pencil

Inside back cover Upper margin For Gretchen 45i (illegible), crayon

Back cover: blank

Date
1977
Object type
sketchbook
Medium and materials
variable on paper
Dimensions
229x152mm
Place Made
Europe (onboard SS Shota Rustaveli) and Auckland, New Zealand
Inscriptions

Front cover Upper margin ink H Scales, Flat 1, 38 Brentwood Avenue, Mt Eden

Front cover UR (not in artist's hand) pencil 79-328

Front cover LR (not in artist's hand) pencil 79-328 QE 355

Page 1 UR crayon H. F. V Scales. Berth 172 RUSTAVALIE [sic]. 22.4.77

Page 5 overleaf LL ink Suez Canal 1977

Page 5 overleaf LR ink Arabia

Page 8 overleaf LL ink H.F.S April 1977

Page 8 overleaf LR ink SUEZ Helen Scales Suez Canal

Page 10 LR crayon curtain 20-4-7

Page 14 overleaf UL margin crayon JACOB

Page 15 UR crayon 14.4.

Page 15 LR crayon ROT

Page 15 overleaf LR ink 7th April 1977

Page 16 LR inversed pencil Port Siad [sic] Egypt 1977 (1978) (erased)

Page 16 overleaf LR ink 6th April 1977 PORT SAID

Page 17 LL ink PIRAEUS

Page 17 LR ink Piraeus April 1977

Page 17 overleaf LR pencil Port Piraeus Greece Flora Scales 1977

Inside back cover Upper margin crayon For Gretchen 45i (illegible)

Details
Provenance

Donated to the Alexander Turnbull Library, National Library of New Zealand by H. F. V. Scales, 1979

Condition Report

17 pages remain from original 30 pages. Page 15 cropped short to suit drawing page 15 overleaf.

Copyright Licence
Courtesy Alexander Turnbull Library, National Library of New Zealand, Reference no. E-355-q
Current Collection

Alexander Turnbull Library, National Library of New Zealand

Current Location

Wellington, New Zealand

General notes

Includes drawings done while Flora Scale's was a passenger on-board the SS Shota Rostaveli on her trip back to New Zealand from France in 1977.

Drawings roughly alternate front and verso between those drawn on the Rostaveli and those done once Scales had returned to her home in Auckland, as though the sketchbook were flipped and used again from back to front.

The inscribed “Flat 1, 38 Brentwood Avenue, Mt Eden” [front cover] refers to her home in Auckland, New Zealand. Scales lived in this Mt Eden address 1975-1978 after she arrived in Auckland from Dunedin. During this time her major solo exhibition, Helen F.V. Scales, was held at the Auckland City Art Gallery. Scales returned to France in late 1976 for a few months before returning again to the Brentwood Avenue address in May 1977. She resided there until 26 October 1978 when she moved to the Rotorua Masonic Village until just before her death in January 1985.

Pages 4, 11, 12, 12 overleaf relate to works Scales painted from Brentwood Avenue, View from Dominion Road [BC087], Three Trees Brentwood Avenue [BC088], Untitled [Three Trees] [BC089].

Pages roughly numbered 1-31 in pencil, presumably by Alexander Turnbull Library, National Library of New Zealand staff, after it's donation in 1979.

When the SS Shota Rustaveli docked in Piraeus, Greece, Scales's niece, Diana Zaharopoulos (nee Westacott, later Mills), collected her and took her home to her flat in Athens for the night. Correspondence Diana Mills to B. de Lange, 02.11.1983, “Although Aunt Lass [Flora] seemed a little older, she still seemed the old Aunt Lass, upright and full of courage.”

This was to be the last journey Scales made between Europe and New Zealand.