Lot Essay
Jeanette Hoorn suggests the present portrait is probably of Cara Haase, a friend from Melbourne, who stayed with the artist and her sisters in Étaples in 1911-13. This work shows the artist's interest in costume (the same costume features in another portrait of Cara from the same period) and was probably executed in Étaples after her first trip to Morocco in 1912. Hilda and her sisters Elsie and Elizabeth spent four summers at Étaples until the outbreak of the Great War.