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Noela Hills, 1983

Noela Hills (16 September 1954 - 19 July 1987) was an Australian graphic artist whose work included illustration, drawing and printmaking. Wanting to go beyond the limitations of silkscreen printing, she developed a techniqueof color pencil drawing, which mixed colors on paper, not unlike that of oil painting. Between 1979 and 1986 she had 11 solo exhibitions of her work, both in Australia and in the UK; she also illustrated five chidren's books as well as many illustrations for newspapers, magazines and book covers, before her premature death at the age of 32.

'Gifted with an insightful nature and dexterous technique, Noela Hills captured our social foibles on paper with her sharpened pencils.'

Life and Work

Noela Hills was born in Brisbane on 16 September 1954 and attended the local Wooloowin School and the Kedron High School, where she became prefect in her senior year. Between 1972 and 1974, she completed an Associate Diploma in Graphic Design at the Queensland College of Art at Seven Hills (Brisbane), majoring in Illustration. On graduating, Hills traveled to London in 1975 to pursue further study. There, she attended the Central School of Art and Design in Southhampton Row. In July 1976 she completed a special advanced course in Printmaking and obtained her Diploma. In London, she shared the studio of ceramic artist Alison Britton in Pancras Rd. NW1 and the two became close friends, each influencing the work of the other in various ways. Soon after graduating, Hills was featured in 'Two Woman Printmakers' at the Barnston Festival, Dorset. In London she also exhibited her work with Britton and Jacqui Poncelet at the Amalgam Gallery and was represented by Mel Calman (The Workshop) in Bloomsbury, and later by the Thumb Gallery in Soho.

No title, silk screen print, edition of 15, 1976

In 1978 Hills married Robert Riddel, a recent graduate in Architecture from the Architecture Association, who had also moved to London from Brisbane in 1970. Based in Islington, the pair traveled in the Netherlands, Sweden and Greece in 1975, Tuscany in 1976 and house-set in Venice for two months in 1977. In July 1978 the couple returned to Australia and lived in Sydney, taking the position of caretakers at Eryldene, the home of the late Professor E.G. Waterhouse. Working from this beautiful home on the North Shore with its famous Camelia garden, Hills prepared for the first two solo exhibitions of her work in 1979.

'First Impressions' opened at the Victor Mace Fine Art Gallery at Bowen Hills in Brisbane in April 1979. At that time, the Mace Gallery was occupying the former Johnstone Gallery. A review by Brisbane-based art critic Gertrude Langer revealed that the drawings exhibited were based on a series of prints done first, but that Hills has 'felt the need for more sensuous colours and textures which indeed she achieved' with blended color pencil. The second exhibition was at the Robin Gibson gallery in Paddington, Sydney in May 1979, with 34 works including both drawings and prints. In Sydney as in Brisbane, the reception of the work was positive. It was described as '... a talent for simplification of line and an edge of good humoured caricature that looks at life with sophisticated whimsy' and '... witty and animated cartoon-like coloured drawings ... in cabaret mood.'

'Florence' silk screen print, edition of 13, 1979

The work soon came to the attention of art directors and commissions for illustrations in various magazines and newspapers followed. A full page colour drawing in Cleo in November 1979 was the beginning of regular illustration work for Australian Consolidated Press in the Australian Weekend magazine as well as Vogue and the Melbourne Age. Book jackets were prepared for the University of Queensland Press on a regular basis. The last of these was for Nightmarkets by Alan Wearne for Penguin Books in 1986.

In June 1979 Hills and Riddel moved to Brisbane, living first in a flat in 'Teneriffe House' until they bought a large and dilapidated wooden house on Brunswick Street, Fortitude Valley in 1980, which they named 'La Scala'. It was a former doctor's house and was arranged as two flats and a surgery. In 1979 Hills won the Queensland Art Gallery L.J. Harvey Memorial Prize for 'Drawing with Tulips in an Italian Glass Jar'. With this and the money she had earned from two sell-out shows, she took a short holiday back to London and friends she was missing. She stayed with Britton who then has a two year old daughter. While in London, she showed some work to Jill George at the Thumb Gallery in Soho, who wanted her drawings immediately and offered her a one-woman show for December 1981, in a year's time. Hills was also asked to design the Christmas card for the gallery and several of her drawings were reproduced as postcards. As well she was invited to submit a drawing for a forthcoming 'Music Show' at the Thumb.

{{Noela Hills}}