Ellis Rowan
| Ellis Rowan | |
|---|---|
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| Born |
Marian Ellis Ryan 30 July 1848 Melbourne, Victoria, Australia |
| Died | 4 October 1922 (aged 74) Macedon, Victoria, Australia |
| Other names | Marian Ellis Rowan |
| Known for | natural history illustration |
| Parent(s) |
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Marian Ellis Rowan (30 July 1848 – 4 October 1922), known as Ellis Rowan, was a well-known Australian botanical illustrator. She also did series of illustrations on birds, butterflies and insects.
Marian, the daughter of Marian and Charles Ryan, principal of stock agents Ryan and Hammond, was born at "Killeen" near Longwood, Victoria, one of her father's pastoral stations in Victoria. Her family was well-connected: sister Ada Mary married Admiral Lord Charles Scott, son of the Duke of Buccleuch; brother Sir Charles Ryan was a noted Melbourne surgeon and for a time Turkish consul in London (and whose daughter became Baroness Casey). Another niece was Joice NanKivell Loch.
She was educated at Miss Murphy's private school in Melbourne, and in 1873 married Captain Charles Rowan, who had fought in the New Zealand wars. Her husband was interested in botany and he encouraged her to paint wild flowers. She had had no training but working conscientiously and carefully in water-colour; her work is noted for being botanically informative as well as artistic. Rowan returned to Melbourne in 1877, and for many years travelled in Australia painting the flora of the country, at times in the company of her painting companion, Margaret Forrest. She published in 1898 A Flower-Hunter in Queensland and New Zealand, largely based on letters to her husband and friends.
About this time she went to North America and provided the illustrations, many in colour, to A Guide to the Wild Flowers, by Alice Lounsberry, published in New York in 1899 as well as Guide to the Trees (1900), and Southern Wild Flowers and Trees (1901) also by Lounsberry. It was while in America, travelling with Lounsberry, that Rowan received news that her son Russell (called "Puck") had been killed in the Second Boer War. In 1905 she held a successful exhibition in London. She returned to Australia and held exhibitions of her work which sold at comparatively high prices. In 1916 she made a trip to New Guinea, the first of several during which she produced a huge volume of illustrations. She contracted malaria during these journeys. In 1920 she held the largest solo exhibition seen in Australia at the time, when she exhibited 1000 of her works in Sydney. She died at Macedon, Victoria, her husband and her only son having predeceased her (her husband died in 1892, aged 47, possibly by suicide; and her son died of nephritis in Africa, aged 22, while in jail awaiting trial on charges of forgery).
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