32: Outhwaite Windows
Ida Rentoul Outhwaite, also known as Ida Sherbourne Rentoul and Ida Sherbourne Outhwaite (9 June 1888 – 25 June 1960), was an Australian illustrator of children's books. Her work mostly depicted fairies. Outhwaite worked predominantly with pen and ink, and watercolour. Her illustrations were exhibited throughout Australia, as well as in London and Paris between 1907 and 1933. She died in Caulfield, Victoria, Australia.
https://www.pinterest.com.au/istanbul408/ida-rentoul-outhwaite-illustrator/
Ida brought fairies to life for generations of Australian children. Her illustrations made significant commentary on the cultural norms of the time and celebrated the power of the feminine in subtle ways.
"I think my favourite scene of hers is from [the book] Elves and Fairies, in which you have koalas sitting around a table and they are all in tails and smoking cigars," says Rebeccca-Anne do Rozario, a lecturer in fantasy and fairy-tales at Monash University.
"That really encapsulates that kind of Anglophile, middle-class Australian at the time, particularly the men I am afraid. "And then she has the ephemeral fairies serving them. "That really struck me as emblematic of what society was like ... at the time."
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2018-10-02/australian-fairytale-legend-ida-rentoul-outhwaite/10285990
Connection to St Mark’s
The first Victorian free children's library was opened in 1926 in the corner room of the Social Settlement Building. The library was given to the children of Fitzroy by Mrs. T. Hackett, in memory of her late husband. The library contained over 3,000 books, as well as children's magazines and even comics. Another internationally famous resident of the neighbourhood, Australian children's book illustrator Ida Rentoul Outhwaite, then at the zenith of her career, was engaged by the relentless Reverend Reginald Nicholls (Brother Bill) incumbent at St Mark’s from 1922-1942. Brother Bill engaged Ida to create something for the library. Ida donated four stained glass windows each with a hand-painted panel executed by her, based upon illustrations from her books, most notably "Elves and Fairies" which was published to great acclaim in Australia and sold internationally in 1916 and "Fairyland" which had been published earlier that year. These four hand painted stained glass windows were equated to the value of £1,000.00, but are priceless today, as they are the only public works of Ida Rentoul Outhwaite ever commissioned that have been executed in this medium. Ida Rentoul Outhwaite was only ever commissioned to create one other public work; a series of four panels executed in watercolour with pencil underdrawing in 1910 for the Prince Henry Hospital's children's wards in Melbourne (now demolished).
The four Ida Rentoul Outhwaite stained glass windows each depict faeries, pixies, Australian native animals and children, taken from her book illustrations. The windows started life in the first free Victorian children’s library. The room was eventually repurposed to be a community lounge, that served as a drop-in lounge and kitchen for Fitzroy's homeless and marginalised citizens and subsequently into offices for the Anglicare staff who run St. Mark's Community Centre, possibly as a way to protect the precious windows from coming to any harm.
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The Ida Rentoul Outhwaite Children's Library Stained Glass Windows are one of Australia's greatest hidden treasures, which seems apt when you consider that the pixies and faeries they depict are also often in hiding when we read about them in children's books and the faerie tales of our childhood. The fact that they are hidden, because it is necessary to enter a little-known and undistinguished building in order to see them, ensures their protection and survival. The windows are unique, not only because they are the only stained glass windows designed and hand-painted by Ida Rentoul Outhwaite, but because they are the earliest and only examples of stained glass art in Australia that deals with theme of childhood.