painter, illustrator and animator, twin daughter (with illustrator Deborah Niland) of writers Darcy Niland and Ruth Park. She attended the Julian Ashton Art School in Sydney in 1967-68 (Dip. Drawing), then travelled in UK and Europe 1960-70, working as a freelance card designer and book illustrator and completing her first book while still in her teens. Since 1971 she has worked in Australia as an illustrator, designer and animator, winning an award as “Best Illustrator of the Year” in 1974. In that year she also began painting and exhibiting in Sydney galleries: at Strawberry Hills (1974), Barry Stern (1974, 1978, 1979 and 1984) and Charles Hewitt (1996). A solo exhibition of her work was also held at Burnie Regional Gallery, Tasmania, in 1996.
Between 1974 and 1992 Niland was involved in writing and/or illustrating over 30 books, for which she has won several awards. She has also won prizes for her meticulously detailed, often wryly comic and slightly surreal miniatures, including a first prize in the miniature section at Sydney’s Royal Easter Show in 1992, 1995 (judge Ken Reinhard) and 1996. (A miniature of a galvanised iron cow in the landscape was shown in the third annual combined Australian miniature show at Sydney in 1996: opened by Joan Kerr). Since 1991 her work has been shown in solo shows in NSW and Tasmania and in prestigious group exhibitions in Australia (including an International Miniature Exhibition in Queensland in which her work was Highly Commended), England and France.
- Writers:
- Kerr, Joan
- Date written:
- 1996
- Last updated:
- 2007
