painter, decorative artist and amateur architect, was born at Morpeth in the Hunter Valley, New South Wales, on 30 June 1827, only surviving daughter of Edward Charles Close and Sarah Susannah, née Palmer. She began painting at least from 1842, when competent watercolour flowers in the meticulous style of Regency book illustrations are known. Her 1843 set of four large watercolours, The Flowers of the [English] Seasons (p.c.), is of an extremely professional standard for a sixteen-year-old colonial girl. This enthusiasm for English flora appears to have been due to a consciousness of her botanical heritage; her paternal grandmother was a grand-daughter of Peter Collinson (1694-1768), the eminent English collector and populariser of new flower species from North America and elsewhere. The influence of painting lessons from Conrad Martens during the 1840s is evident in her early landscape drawings and watercolours.

Marrianne Close was a grand-niece of Sophia Campbell whose fourth son, George Palmer Campbell (1818-81), she married in the family church, St James’s Church of England, Morpeth, on 24 August 1854. About fifty silhouette portraits by Marrianne (1847, p.c.) include all the Australian Palmer and Campbell clans, as well as her own family; she must have known George most of her life. After the marriage the Campbells lived mainly at Duntroon, a property on the Limestone Plains (now Canberra, ACT) George inherited from his father. Marrianne designed numerous additions to Duntroon in the early 1860s, including cottages for the workers, the gardener and the manager of the estate, stables, fencing and a 'bees’ house’. She also sketched a plan for the entire rebuilding of the homestead but only half was built. It survives attached to the cottage built by her father-in-law in the early 1830s as part of the Royal Military College, Duntroon, but most of her outbuildings have been demolished. She also designed Duntroon’s gardens, including a maze (now recreated) modelled on that at Hampton Court Palace, which she had visited on one of her English trips.

Watercolours of English flowers, landscapes and architectural designs continued to be produced after her marriage, along with embroideries, knitting and lace-work; but Marrianne had inherited what was virtually a feudal system at Duntroon. A devout Anglican, she felt a primary obligation towards the religious, social and intellectual life and physical well being of the Duntroon tenants. She became better known in the district for her medical dispensary than for her paintings. Between 1855 and 1871 she also produced six children: John Edward Robert, Sophia Susanna, Frederick Arthur, Edward Charles Close, Sarah Marrianne Emily and Robert George.

From the mid 1880s – after the deaths of her husband, youngest son and elder daughter and while her surviving sons were in England – Campbell lived at Duntroon and at Elizabeth Bay, Sydney, with her younger daughter, another Marrianne, until the latter married in 1891. From 1883 until the end of her life, she painted a large number of delicate watercolours and a few oils of native flowers, landscapes and still-lifes. She continued to design minor improvements to Duntroon.

The National Library holds several flower paintings, including a waratah painted in oil on board, plus a few watercolour views. Most of her surviving work, however, including a large album of watercolours done on a trip to England, Scotland, Ireland and Europe in 1877-78, two volumes of meticulously executed botanical paintings from Australia and New Zealand and a household book containing architectural drawings, medical remedies and newspaper cuttings, remain in family possession. Marrianne Campbell died on 2 May 1903 and was buried in the family plot in St John’s churchyard, Canberra.

Writers:
Kerr, Joan
Date written:
1992
Last updated:
1989