Dorothea Margaret Bisset,known as Margaret, was the daughter of successful businessman and inveterate letter writer O.D. Bisset and his wife Gwen, recent immigrants from Britain who had settled at Warrawee north of Sydney. After attending Abbotsleigh, which had a well established lively arts program for its girls, she studied ceramics at East Sydney Technical College.
As with most of her generation her life was reshaped by World War II. In 1942, at her 21st birthday party, her patriotic parents invited a group of visiting British airman to the party. One of the party was A. J. (Tony) Tuckson, a Spitfire pilot who shared her interest in the visual arts. The following May the couple were engaged, although Tuckson was then posted to Darwin. They were married on 23 November 1943. Their son, Michael, was born in 1945. Margaret and Michael remained in Australia at her parents’ home while Tony was posted back to England until early 1946 when he returned to Australia where he was discharged from the RAF.
For the following three years the family lived at the Bisset family home. Tony studied art under the Commonwealth Reconstruction Training Scheme while Margaret resumed her pottery, studying under Mollie Douglas and Peter Rushforth. She joined them to become one of the founders of the Potters Society of Australia.
In 1950 Tony joined the Art Gallery of New South Wales, where he eventually became Deputy Director. Gradually he ceased to show his art, so much so that even most of the gallery staff were unaware that he was continuing to develop his work, all in private. Their first house at East Gordon was the site of her first attempt at raku firing as she continued to experiment with ceramic forms.
In 1958 she and Tony joined Dr Stuart Scougall’s expedition to Snake Bay, Melville Island where he commissioned works to enter the collection of the Art Gallery of New South Wales. She was an active participant in recording the works as they were being made. The Tutini are among the gallery’s most prized possessions. The following year the Tucksons travelled on another collecting expedition to Arnhem Land. Margaret photographed the artists collaborating on the bark paintings that now form the core of the Art Gallery of New South Wales’ collection.
In 1962 they moved to a new house in Lucinda Avenue Wahroonga. The house, designed by Russell Jack, took into account both Tony’s painting and Margaret’s ceramics as her studio included a kiln. The adventurous design included a long terrace so that the house backed directly onto the bush. Most of her works in public collections come from this period.
In 1965 the Tucksons visited New Guinea for the first time, and Margaret developed a life-long passion for New Guinea ceramics. She made many return visits throughout the rest of her life. With Patricia May, who she met when May was first appointed to the NSW Gallery as curatorial assistant, she undertook many expeditions to record the work of individual potters as well as noting regional differences. Their book, The Traditional Pottery of Papua New Guinea remains the authoritative account of the field.
In 1973, just before the Art Gallery opened its first dedicated gallery for Aboriginal and Melanesian art, Tony Tuckson died. Margaret ensured that his wishes about the display and the information on the artists were carried out. Although he had begun again to exhibit his paintings, his public profile was simply as an arts bureaucrat.
In the decades after Tony’s death Margaret ensured that his thousands of paintings and drawings were all catalogued and then, with Watters Gallery. carefully released onto the market. She was the driving force behind the publication of the first monograph of his work and continued to generously encourage scholars and curators to see and know the full depth of his oeuvre. In this she was assisted by Richard McMillan, who wrote his masters thesis on Tuckson’s work and later by Ian Gunn. At the same time she continued to be an advocate for Papua New Guinea ceramics, supporting and encouraging potters to have faith in their work.
A few days before she died she visited the Art Gallery of New South Wales, to see again the New Guinea work she had assisted in acquiring.
- Writers:
-
Joanna Mendelssohn
- Date written:
- 2014
- Last updated:
- 2014
