Reference: see Australian Sculptors and Artworks in Three Dimensions, “( One Man’s Collection – A Personal Journey )” by David James Angeloro. (Excerpt of a draft July, 2020. An eBook by David Angeloro.
Barabara Tribe is mentioned throughout and a biography is included:
TRIBE, RHODA BARBARA
(Mrs Jack A. Singleman)
BORN: 20th June 1913 at Edgecliff (Sydney), New South Wales
DIED: 21st October 2000 at Penzance, Cornwall, England, United Kingdom
Barbara Tribe was a sculptor (modeller, caster and carver), painter, printmaker, potter and art teacher. Her parents were Englishman Rupert Harry Tribe (a.k.a. ‘The Duke’) [1886-1956] and South African Rhoda Louise Dye [1881-1971], Barbara having two siblings (Marjorie Mary [1909-1981] and Barry Collier [1911-1999] Tribe). In 1910, the Tribe family emigrated from England to Australia, settling in Sydney. Barbara’s father was a well-known Sydney Bohemian, working as a journalist with Norman Lindsay and other Sydney-based black-and-white artists. On 24th April 1947, Barbara Tribe married fellow artist and potter (also architect) Jack A. Singleman [1907-1961] at Kensington, England, the couple having no children.
As a youth, Barbara Tribe was quite athletic and immersed herself in Sydney’s beach culture, learning acrobatics and participating in swimming carnivals. At the age of 15 years, she enrolled in the two-year art course at East Sydney Technical College (ESTC) under Englishman Rayner Hoff [1894-1937], studying art and especially sculpture between 1928 and 1933. She earned her Diploma in Modelling and Sculpture with honours, afterward being appointed Hoff’s Assistant (1932-1933) to work on Sydney’s ANZAC Memorial and teach evening classes at the ESTC. In 1932, she designed the elaborate float that represented the A.I.F. in the Sydney Harbour Bridge opening parade. At the age of 19 years, she was awarded the ESTC’s Bronze Medal in June1933, the School’s highest honour.
Between 1931 and 1934, Barbara Tribe exhibited at the Society of Artists’ Exhibitions in Sydney, the youngest artist to have work accepted. From 1935, she was a Member of the Society of Artists and exhibited at the Women’s Industrial Arts Society. By 1934, she shared a studio in the city with Jean Elwing [1911-1992], a dramatic art and sculpture student. In February 1934 at the age of only 21 years, Tribe exhibited her sculpture at the Anthony Hordern’s Gallery among a collection of impressionist and post-impressionist paintings. The Sydney Morning Herald art critic noted (26th February 1934)
“...establishes Miss Tribe not as a young sculptor of promise, but as a sculptor of mature powers, who already is fit to take her place among the finest Australian exponents of this art.”
The same critic summed up Barbara’s work at this time by describing two pieces.
“One of the striking features of Miss Tribe’s work is its variety of mood. There could scarcely be a greater contrast than between Bacchanale and the seated female figure Reverie. The first is an intricate group in plaster, built up with a masterly feeling for cumulative design and rhythm. The work is built on a roughly pyramidal scheme. At the apex, a maenad poises in mad ecstasy as she clasps her cymbals. This figure is supported by the upraised arm of a centaur; while around the base there swirls a wild array of animals and satyrs. The whole group is inflamed by a colossal zest of motion, which animates every figure and draws it into relationship with the ensemble. In Reverie on the other hand, the impression is entirely one of self-contained serenity and charm. This figure, like all the others demonstrates Miss Tribe’s thorough knowledge of human form. The effect is not only superficially true as regards the musculature and the general proportions of the frame. These portraits in bronze are inspired with genuine life and personality. They are remarkably virile, too. Work possessing such breadth of thought and expression is unexpected from a girl of Miss Tribe’s years, and from an artist who never studied nor observed outside Australia.”
Other art authorities agreed because in April 1935 Barbara Tribe was awarded the N.S.W. Travelling Scholarship (£250 per year for two years) which enabled her to travel to the United Kingdom. This was not only a first for a female artist, but Barbara Tribe was also the first sculptor to win this prestigious award.
On the 9th July 1935, Barbara Tribe left for London aboard the Hobson Bay. In London, she continued her studies at the Royal Academy Schools between 1935 and 1940, City and Guilds School of Art under Edgar Frith [1890-1974] between 1936 and 1937, Regent Street Polytechnic School of Art under Harold Brownsword [1885-1961] and St Martin’s School of Art between circa 1940 and 1945, also studying under sculptors Reid Dick [1879-1961], Gilbert Bayes [1872- 1953] and Frank Hardiman [1891-1949]. In 1936 and 1937, she entered the Prix de Rome, but didn’t win, her first artistic setback. Despite receiving a letter from the ailing Rayner Hoff suggesting that she should apply for his position as head of the Sculpture Department at ESTC, she decided to remain in the United Kingdom. In addition to becoming a leading sculptor and exhibitor in Britain, between the 1950s and 1990s, she taught sculpture at the Penzance School of Art.
As the end of her scholarship approached, Barbara Tribe convinced the owner of the huge Selfridge Department Store to provide her with publicity and an in-store studio from which she created a mask in an hour for the store’s customers, relief and portrait busts took longer and of course cost more. This innovative piece of marketing was a huge success for both the store and Barbara. Within a short time, she required the assistance of her close friend Jean Elwing who had studied with her under Hoff but was in London to study dramatic arts. After four months, Tribe established a large studio at Earl’s Court and all the publicity kept her and Elwing busy. It was also such a success story that journalists wrote articles about her and the Ace Film Company made a short documentary of Barbara Tribe sculpting a portrait bust. With the money earned, Tribe planned to travel to Europe, especially Berlin, Munich and Rome, but her plans were interrupted by the outbreak of war.
During World War II, Barbara Tribe worked in London for the Ministry of Works’ Ancient Monument Department, during one assignment being blown from her bicycle by a German bomb, causing her to be deaf in one ear. During the war, she created a number of impressive and sensitive portrait busts of Australian servicemen.
In 1947, British art critic Eric Newton illustrated Barbara Tribe’s sculpture in his monograph, British Sculptors 1944-1946, which included Henry Moore, Barbara Hepworth, Frank Dobson, Kenneth Armitage and Charles Wheeler. It was at this time, Barbara Tribe moved to Cornwall where she established a studio in an old Sunday School at Sheffield, Penzance which had its own kiln for firing terracotta and pottery. She now created sculpture in bronze, marble, stone, wood and fired terracotta and also produced paintings, drawings, prints and pottery. She supplemented her income by teaching modelling and sculpture at Penance School of Art (1948- 1988), her husband teaching pottery. Around the time of her father’s death, Barbara suffered a breakdown but recovered to resume her illustrious career.
Barbara Tribe’s reputation grew in the United Kingdom, Europe and Australia. In the United Kingdom, she exhibited at the Royal Academy, United Artists, Society of Women Artists, Women’s International Art Club, Scottish Society of Women Artists, London Group, Fieldborne Galleries (Newlyn), St Ives Art Society of Artists, the Scottish Academy and Royal Cambrian Academy of Arts. In 1954, she was elected a member of the Society of Portrait Sculptors, receiving its highest award, the Jean Masson Davidson Silver Medal in 1998. In 1957, she was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of Women Sculptors and in 1998, a Senior Academician of the Royal West of England Academy. Barbara Tribe was a life member of the Association Internationale des Arts Plastiques (UNESCO, Paris).
Barbara Tribe received a large number of commissions from Australia and around the world. From 1966, she has travelled extensively, including a number of visits to Australia. Tribe’s sculpture has always exhibited a strong feeling of character whether represented in a portrait bust, figure study, group composition or her animal studies. During her six visits to Thailand [1973- 1980], Khmer sculpture exerted a powerful influence on her later work. Barbara Tribe sculpted for seventy years, right up to the day of her death.
Barbara Tribe has been honoured through a number of retrospective exhibits, including in 1979 and 1981 at the Stokes-on-Trent Gallery and in 1981 at the Mall Gallery in London. After her death, the Barbara Tribe Foundation was established to provide art scholarships to emerging artists.
COLLECTIONS: National Gallery of Australia; Australian War Memorial; National Portrait Gallery (Canberra); Art Gallery of NSW; National Galley of Victoria; Art Gallery of South Australia; Stoke-on-Trent Museum and Art Gallery; Spode Potteries Museum and Gallery; Esperanto Museum (Vienna); Royal Air Force Museum at Hendon.
BIBLIOGRAPHY:
Barbara Tribe: Sculptor by Patricia R. McDonald, 2000;
HERITAGE: National Art Book by Joan Kerr, 1995;
Australian Women Sculptors: Women’s Work in Three Dimensions [1788-1940] by David Angeloro; Sydney; 2015.
Australian Sculptors; Encyclopedia of Australian Artists; Ladies Picture Show; Who's Who in International Art and Antique, Melrose Press, Cambridge, UK 1976.
MEDIA SOURCES: Sydney Morning Herald (14th March 1932; 3rd March 1933; 24th June 1933; 26th & 28th February 1934; 16th February, 4th & 9th April, 10th June, & 4th & 8th July, & 17th August 1935; 26th June 1937; 12th February & 28th April 1938); Canberra Times (20th May 1944); Sydney Herald (20th May 1951).
[Works from the David Angeloro Sculpture Collection were sold at Davidson Auctions, Fine Art, featuring the David Angeloro Collection of Australian Sculpture, Sunday August 16th, 2020]. [Information on artists included in this publication has been included in the Scheding Index]
Publishing details: Published online August 2020.
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