Otago Sculpture Trust

In Site Library - Greater Dunedin: D. M. Stuart (Queens Gardens) (1898)

InSite

Dr. Stuart Memorial......Queens Gardens...  W.L. Morison, Sculptor

With no apparent ceremony the recently cleaned statue of Dr D.M. Stuart is again on view having been covered for some weeks. The statue is not in its original location, having been moved from lower High Street in 1922 to make way for a tram line. It used to be said that the good doctor moved from looking at his Queen (the statue of Victoria further round Queen's Gardens) to looking at a brothel. However, the memorial to the Reverend Dr. Donald McNaughton Stuart merits more attention than this smart crack. The recent cleaning reveals what a fine sculpture it is. Furthermore, the statue has a unique place in the history of public art in this country. It was the first major civic commission to be granted to a New Zealand resident artist anywhere in the country.

The commission came about through the persistence of President of the Otago Art Society, William Matthew Hodgkins. Hodgkins was an accomplished watercolour painter and a champion of local art. He was also the father of two talented artist daughters, Isobel Field and the great Frances Hodgkins. Unfortunately, he did not witness the unveiling of the Dr. Stuart memorial in June1898, having died earlier that year.

Dr. Stuart was minister of Knox church for thirty years and a prominent and popular member of Dunedin society. After his death in 1894, thousands of people followed his coffin to his final resting place in the Southern Cemetery and within days a meeting in the Town Hall had decided that a statue was a suitable memorial. A prize of £25 was offered to the best design and the contract was subsequently awarded to William Leslie Morison, a Scots-born artist who ran a School of Art in Wellington. After the design was approved, it was modelled full size in plaster before being sent to Britain to be cast in bronze. It arrived in Dunedin, shipped for free by the Shaw Savill Line, on the last day of May in 1898.

Dr Stuart is shown in contemporary dress. The figure is over life size and is portrayed sitting in a 'curule' chair draped in a plaid shawl. The chair resembles an elaborate camp stool and is a classical symbol of high civic esteem. In its seated portrayal and introspective mood the sculpture resembles the painting of Dr Stuart by the Italian Painter Girolamo Pieri Nerli which belongs to Otago Girls High School. The two artists met in Dunedin and Nerli painted Morison's portrait. That picture is now in the Auckland City Art Gallery.

There was great interest when the statue was unveiled and a sizable crowd attended. Approval was not universal. One critic commented that the good Doctor was "conspicuous by his feet" and detected in the pose a lamentable lack of decorum. It was incongruous, the writer felt, that Dr Stuart should be portrayed as if going outdoors without "the least semblance of a hat."

The city council are to be congratulated in conserving this fine work although it has not been afforded the same protection as the statue of Robert Burns and Dr Stuart's head is already stained white from the deposits of roosting birds.

Richard Dingwall

Text Copyright Richard Dingwall