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painter, was born in Hobart Town on 28 March 1857, second of the eight children of Edward Hunter Cole, a merchant. By 1859 the family had moved to Geelong, Victoria, where Chassie (who also used 'Cara’ as a nom de plume ) was educated at the French College, Villamanta Street. She showed an early interest in art and began entering various exhibitions, starting with the Ballarat Juvenile Exhibition of 1878. She won silver medals in both sections of the Geelong Juvenile and Industrial Exhibition (1880), a set of Sévres vases for her paintings on silk and satin shown in the Melbourne Juvenile Exhibition (1880), and a second order of merit for her paintings on velvet and silk in the Melbourne Centennial International Exhibition (1881). After the 1881 exhibition closed, Chassie offered her entries to the public in an art union, the first of several lotteries which became known as 'Cara’ art unions. This included practical offerings such as a firescreen, banners and d’oyleys as well as framed paintings on silk; later ones were to contain as many as twenty oil paintings, their subjects varying from landscape views of Geelong, other parts of Victoria and New Zealand, to animal and flower paintings.

As a result of these promotions and the skill she displayed, Cole received a variety of commissions. A lithograph, Australian Ferns , was included in Patchett Martin’s Fernshawe: Sketcher in Prose and Verse (Melbourne 1882), and she illuminated several addresses presented to respected members of the community on their departure from Geelong. In addition to producing numerous watercolours and oil paintings from her home, Pilrig, on Newtown Hill, Geelong, she offered painting lessons there from 1888. They proved so popular that by 1892 she had relocated her classes to a room in the Mechanics’ Institute. At the Sons of Temperance Hall in Ryrie Street that year, she organised an exhibition of almost 100 paintings by her pupils and about fourteen of her own works. The local newspaper commented that the former had 'not so much originality as could be wished’ but nevertheless showed 'evidence of a thoroughly sound method of training’. By 1895 Cole had taken over a portion of Elsdon Chambers in Moorabool Street as a studio where she could exhibit her own work and that of her pupils.

Chassie Cole showed paintings at the 1888-89 Melbourne International Exhibition, with the Victorian Artists’ Society in 1895, and elsewhere in Victoria. She exhibited at the 1889 New Zealand and South Seas Exhibition at Dunedin, as well as in Britain, remaining active until her death at Geelong in August 1941.

Also:

Melbourne International Exhibition 1880: Ladies Court – no.1574 Cole, Chassie, Geelong – Flowers painted on silk. At the Melbourne Centennial International Exhibition 1888-89: Various Paintings, Drawings, etc. – no.16 Cole, Miss Chassie A., Barkly street, St Kilda – 'Shade and Shine’ (Hon. Mention); Ladies Court – no.188 'Where the rude axe was never heard’. She also received a third order of merit for her Daylight Fades .

Writers:

Filmer, Veronica Note: Heritage biography.

Date written:

1995

Last updated:

2011