Reginald Sturgess

Who was Reginald Sturgess?

Reginald Ward Sturgess was an Australian artist.

Sturgess was born in 1892 in the Melbourne suburb of Newport, Victoria, the son of cabinet maker Edward Sturgess and his wife Emma, migrants from Bath, England. Sturgess had three brothers and a sister, but one brother died in England before the family migrated, and the other brother died soon after the family's arrival in Australia. Sturgess was the youngest child, and the only one born in Australia. The family was interested in the arts, particularly Sturgess' father, but also his elder sister Florence, who went on to become a successful pianist. Edward Sturgess was a good craftsman, having on one occasion decorated a carriage for Queen Victoria, but the economic slump of the 1890s following the land boom in Victoria led to a lack of business, and he abandoned cabinet making for a seed business in 1893.

Sturgess was educated at the Williamstown South State School, in the adjacent suburb of Williamstown, before leaving school at the age of twelve. In 1905, Sturgess enrolled in the art schools at the National Gallery of Victoria, with the help of novelist and Williamstown local Ada Cambridge, who had noticed his artistic talents. There, Sturgess studied drawing under Frederick McCubbin in the School of Design, and from 1909, painting under Lindsay Hall. Sturgess won several prizes while at the Gallery, including first prize for a drawing of a head from life in 1909, second prize for a painting of still life in 1910, and first prize for landscape painting in 1911.