painter, draughtsman, art teacher and surveyor, was born in Dublin, Ireland. Two Indian ink sketches, Old Oak Above Adelaide Cottage August 1843 and Queen Victoria’s Tree in Windsor Forest 1845, were done in his last years of guard duty at Windsor Castle, his commanding officer Captain Durford being said to have complained bitterly over the use of stationary for him to do them, according to family records. Both are now in Windsor Castle library. In 1849 Hogan migrated to Auckland, where he taught drawing, published lithographs and worked as a surveyor. He is considered the first person to have taught art in New Zealand, advertising classes in the New Zealander on 20 February 1850.
On l March 1858 Hogan left New Zealand for Sydney and took up a temporary position in the New South Wales Surveyor-General’s Department. According to Platts, he continued to work as a draughtsman in the Surveying Department until his death, yet an 1863 Sydney directory lists him as an 'artist’ of George Street, Balmain – presumably either a spare-time activity or an unsuccessful interlude in his life. In 1867 his 'pen etching’ of Queen Adelaide’s Oak was included in the Paris Universal Exhibition. The drawings he showed at the New South Wales Academy of Art’s first exhibition in 1872 were considered 'very good’, while two other pen-and-ink outline drawings of oak trees in Great Park, Windsor were shown with the Academy and at the Metropolitan Intercolonial Exhibition organised by the Agricultural Society of New South Wales in 1874, where they were were highly commended. One of the latter scenes remained with the family until the 1940s, but both are now missing. Hogan also exhibited oil paintings of New Zealand subjects such as At the Bay of Islands and Waikato River . Most were for sale, despite his proclaimed amateur status.
- Writers:
- Staff Writer
- Date written:
- 1992
- Last updated:
- 2011
