Design and Art Australia Online

painter, illustrator and cartoonist, was born on 14 December 1868 at Balmain, Sydney, the seventh child of English-born Francis Spence, a civil servant, and Hannah, née Turnbull. He was raised in Fiji. By 1888 he was back in Sydney taking lessons at the Art Society of NSW. He was a foundation member of its Sketch Club in 1888 and exhibited with it. A sketchbook of his pencil portraits includes one of R.L. Stevenson, evidently done in 1893: 'Archibald took Robert Louis Stevenson to visit the artists’ camp at Balmoral where the Scottish writer was sketched by Bulletin artists B.E. Minns and Percy Spence, who were living there with Julian Ashton , Streeton and Roberts . Spence’s sketch is in the National Portrait Gallery, London’ (Moore, SAA , cited McCulloch and Rolfe, 43).

Spence worked as an illustrator for the Daily Telegraph [acc. ADB ], the Sydney Mail (McCulloch), the Illustrated Sydney News , Queensland Punch [McCulloch] and especially the Sydney Bulletin (from c.1890). He also contributed illustrations to the Town and Country Journal (see file). His ISN story illustrations include four pen drawings for 'Gnomes and Gnails’ by Jessie Whitfeld (using the pen name 'Mary Feld’), Illustrated Sydney News 20 December 1890. Other illustrations for the ISN are: Poo-bah-ton, O’k-nor and Ko 16 December 1893 (cover on corruption?); A world-famed novelist – Robert Louis Stevenson 25 March 1893 (cover); Fijian warrior equipped for the dance 23 December 1893, 3; “So nice, you know” , title page 20 May 1893; Old Times have changed, old manners gone (comparing governors with convicts) title page ISN 8 April 1893 (no original); and Scene of Crime on wet night (original DL Pe Z4Z), published ISN 23 December 1893, 17. His original 1893 'Circus Sketches’ are at DL Pxx 57 and another 1890 original is at ML PXD 764. He had a painting in the 1893 Chicago International Exhibition (Columbia World’s Fair).

On 30 January 1894 Spence married Jessie Wright at Ashfield and they went to England for a year. They had two daughters, born in Sydney in 1895 and 1896. A report of an Art Society of NSW Smoke Night in September 1897 stated:

But to draw lightning sketches, with all the disadvantages of brown paper, in front of a gallery of critics, and gain not only a favourable verdict but a storm of cheers – that is something of which to be proud; and so Messrs A.R. Coffey, Perry, Spence, Leon Pole, G. Taylor, and Salvana are to be complimented on that often mentioned but seldom realised event – an artistic success ( Sydney Morning Herald 13 September 1897, 3).

Spence’s Bulletin cartoons include: When Women Vote (anti-suffrage cartoon n.d., ill. Coleman & Tanner 20); man on horseback reading the Bulletin entitled Bliss , cover of Xmas issue19 December 1891 (ill. Rolfe, 82, also in file) & also Bulletin Newspaper Coy large independent print (ML PxD514/ 105); A Ruling Passion 1891 (milkman and maid re Jersey cow/governor joke – not funny – ill. Rolfe 41); More “Self Denial”. 'HE (sob): “Now, let’s see of what else shall I deny myself ? Ah, I have it! The wife can do without that new bonnet” 22 July 1893, 13; A Family Connection. 'Landowner’s daughter (scornfully): “Surely you don’t claim relationship with us! How were you connected with my grandfather?”/ Old man (apologetically): “Only by a bit of leg chain, Miss; but we was werry intimate”’ 1894 (ill. Rolfe, 75); 'Station overseer: “You camp at Mulga tank tonight; take some BAITS; see if you can catch any dingoes.”/ New chum: “Very well, Mr. Johnston, but – er – where is the FISHING ROD?”’ 1895 (newchum gag signed 'Percy F.S. Spence/ London/ ’95, ill. Rolfe 93).

Back at London in 1895, Spence joined the Chelsea Arts Club and contributed work to Black and White and The Graphic . Later he drew for the Sphere , Illustrated London News , Punch , Harpur’s Monthly , Ludgate Monthly , Pall Mall Magazine and Windsor Magazine [and see ADB for others]. The 1898 Grafton Gallery Exhibition of Australian Art included cat.2: Percy F.S. Spence [no address], 'Two Drawings’ and cat. 5 'Two Drawings’ lent by the “Bulletin” newspaper Co., Sydney. He illustrated Britain’s Austral Empire , mainly with portraits of Australian politicians of the day. Greenwall notes that his drawings about the Boer War appeared in With the Flag to Pretoria , and he contributed over 20 illustrations to The Graphic between January 1900 and 13 July 1901. He also continued painting in oils; his Portrait of a Gentleman 1898, oil on wood panel, was included in Sotheby’s auction of 'The Fairfax Corporate Collection of Australian Paintings’ 17 November 2002, lot 79 (est. $1,000-1,500, not ill.). He was hung at the RA in 1899, 1900 and 1901.

Spence and family returned to Sydney in 1905-6. There he drew illustrations for Lone Hand , e.g. Roderic Quinn’s poem 'Homing Sails’, drawing dated 1908 published 1 March 1910, 486; wash drawing 'Glacarium Girl’, Lone Hand 7 (1 September 1910), 379. Back at London in 1910, Spence spent the year working on 75 watercolours for Frank Fox’s [ADB 8] Australia . Postcards published in England by Raphael Tuck & Sons in their 'Australian Life’ series were originally illustrations in Fox’s Australia (London: A. & C. Black, 1911 [1910 acc. ADB ]). He also had postcards in the NSW Bookstall Co’s 'Art Series’ (see Cook). His oil painting, Australian Fleet entering Sydney Harbour 1913, was purchased for the Royal collection. Like Tom Roberts , Spence served with the RAMC during WWI. He died in Middlesex Hospital, London, on 3 August 1933.

According to Carol Mills, the books Spence illustrated include: F. Agar, Eros! Eros Wins! (Sydney: NSW Bookstall Co., 1910, new edn 1911), Edward Dyson, Tommy the hawker and Snifter his boy (Sydney: NSW Bookstall Co., 1911), Fergus Hume, The Dwarf’s Chamber and Other Stories (London: Ward Lock, 1896), and “Ironbark” (G.M. Gibson), Ironbark Chips and Stockwhip Cracks (Melbourne, George Robertson, 1893?), with 78 illustrations by Spence and Alf Vincent . His illustrated books for children include Ernest Favenc’s Marooned in Australia (London: Blaikie, 1897), The Secret of the Australian Desert (London: Blaikie, 1896) and Tales for Young Australia (Melbourne: Empson, 1900?), as well as Arthur Ferres’s His First Kangaroo (London: Blackie, c.1898).

Writers:

Kerr, Joan

Date written:

1996

Last updated:

2007