Design and Art Australia Online

sketcher, was called Jane Dorothea Claude, reputedly of French descent, before she married David Cannan (c.1827-77) of Kirkcudbrightshire, Scotland, early in 1853. Soon afterwards the couple left for Victoria, David having been appointed Australian agent for the English prefabricated iron exporters, Morewood & Rogers. They reached Melbourne on 14 August 1853 and found temporary lodgings at 10 Elm Terrace, Collingwood, while awaiting the arrival of a Morewood & Rogers portable iron house from England. On 11 September 1853 Jane wrote that she was 'trying to fill a little book with views of the town and buildings connected with galvanised iron to send to Morewood & Rogers’ as David thought this would be 'very useful to them’. In the same month, while her husband was on a business trip to Adelaide, Jane wrote to an aunt in Berlin that she was keeping herself occupied with sketching and was 'going to try an autographic press – by means of which I can print off pen and ink sketches’. No prints are known. Her surviving works are all meticulous pencil sketches in Victorian picturesque style of houses, landscapes and streetscapes in Melbourne and its environs.

The four-roomed iron cottage finally arrived towards the end of September while David was still in Adelaide. On 29 November they moved into their almost complete house, 'of a sort of light bluish tinge’, set far back on a long narrow piece of ground at Prahran with 'a grand wooden paling all round -six feet [182 cm] high’ made from 'good broad packing case boards’. Jane wrote that she was 'quite delighted with the idea of being in such a rural situation’. The building was wood-framed and had both external and internal iron cladding, the latter being papered.

As well as sketching Morewood & Rogers’s iron houses (including her own), Jane used an autographic press 'by means of which I can print off pen and ink sketches’; some extant prints monographed 'JC’ (LT) appear to be her work. Most of surviving works, however, are meticulous pencil sketches in Victorian picturesque style of houses, landscapes and streetscapes in Melbourne and its environs.

A daughter, Louisa, was born in Melbourne but died in 1854, aged nine months. Her mother drew a sketch of her grave and a general view of the cemetery in which she was buried. The Cannans later had two more children, Charles and Edwin, both of whom grew to maturity. Jane died in Madeira in about 1861, shortly after Edwin’s birth. During her short life she had sent numerous sketches and letters to her relatives, including scenes in both Australia and Madeira. Some of the former are in Australian public collections, the latter still in family possession. Her photograph by A. Schmidt of Berlin is in the National Library’s Cannan Collection.

Writers:

Kerr, Joan

Date written:

1995

Last updated:

2011