Mary Young Hunter

Mary Young Hunter or Young-Hunter (1872 – 1947) was a New Zealand painter. Her works were included in the book Women Painters of the World.

Early life Hunter was born Mary Towgood, on April 11, 1872, in Napier, New Zealand. She was the daughter of Edward Towgood (1838-1882) and Edith Emma Tyler (1849-1919). At the age of nine, she left New Zealand on a sailing ship and came to England where she lived until she went to school in Lausanne, Switzerland. She married John Young-Hunter on November 18, 1899, in Kensington, England.

Career

In 1889, she and her husband traveled to Italy, where they lived in a studio in Florence. She painted in Perugia, Assisi, and Siena. Both she and her husband were involved in the new Pre-Raphaelitism group of painters. In 1920, she learned the technique of Gesso painting, a paint mixture used by early Italian artists.

She was a lifelong friend of Princess Louise, Duchess of Argyll, the fourth daughter of Queen Victoria. Mary Hunter painted the son of Sir Arthur McKenzie, the daughters of Lord and Lady Londonderry, the son of Lord and Lady Castlereagh, Mary and Catherine Pillsbury, Henry McKnight, the daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Amos Pinchot, the daughters of Jean Webster and Blanchette Hooker (now Mrs. John D. Rockefeller, III). She also painted American diplomat Sumner Welles as the age of three. One of last works was an unfinished portrait of her granddaughter Marcia Kuster. She later moved to Carmel Valley. .

Joy and the Labourer Olivia Where Shall Wisdom be Found?

Death Hunter died on September 8, 1947, in Carmel-by-the-Sea, California, at the age of 75. Services were held at the El Carmelo Cemetery in Pacific Grove.

Gallery