Ida Harriet Carey

Ida Harriet Carey (3 October 1891 – 23 August 1982) was a New Zealand artist and art teacher. She was well known for portraits of Māori men, women, including the Māori Queen Dame Te Atairangikaahu, and children.

Early life Ida Harriet Carey was born on 3 October 1891 at Taonui, near Feilding in the Manawatu. She was one of four children of Richard Carey, a farmer who had emigrated to New Zealand from Australia in the 1870s, and his wife Elizabeth . She studied music and became a piano teacher. In 1910, the Carey family moved to Tuhikaramea, near Hamilton. A few years later, Carey moved to Te Aroha, on the Kaimai Ranges, and then to nearby Matamata by 1921. Carey would remain involved with the society for almost 50 years, serving two terms as president, from 1945 to 1948 and 1952 to 1954.

By 1969 Carey had retired from teaching but still took students for private lessons. She was also a life member of the Waikato Society of Arts, being conferred with this status in 1964.

The Ida Carey Gallery at the Waikato Museum Te Whare Taonga o Waikato is named in her honour. The museum subsequently held a retrospective exhibition of her work in 2018, which featured companion works by other female New Zealand artists. The playwright Campbell Smith wrote a play based on the life of Carey, titled Ada and I, which was performed in Hamilton in 2014.