Controversy at Suva Exhibition . . .

Of the 107 exhibits at the 1954 Exhibition of the Fiji Arts Club in May, the most controversial was the oil painting “Madonna of the Palms”, the work of Mrs. T.

H. Parker, wife of the Senior Collector of Customs in Suva.

Mrs. Parker signs her paintings with her maiden name, Humbert, and has wide recognition overseas. She is shown here with her “Madonna”.

Mrs. Parker had an early and notable career in various academies -overseas. She was born in Constantinople, where her father was German Consul at the turn of the century, and after training as a child she was accepted as a pupil for portrait work by the Italian artist Pisani.

She qualified as a school teacher during World War I.

Later, she again turned to painting, but was rejected by the modernistic Berlin Academy of Arts and Crafts because her work was too academic. She then took to literature, qualified as a doctor of philosophy at Gottingen, was accepted as a Fellow of Hunter College, New York, and appointed

assistant professor at Vassar College.

Here she resumed her art studies and exhibited regularly.

Later, she conducted an art class in Bermuda and acted as critic.

She arrived in Fiji with her husband

last year. Discussing it as a painter sees it, she said: “Fiji has an extraordinary colouring. There are silvery-purple qualities in the air, clouds and sea which I find unusual and often baffling.”—

Jack Thornton.

Nouvelles Tahitiennes, a new official paper, recently began publication in Papeete, Tahiti. The new journal presents official news without comment.