Jean Bellette

Jean Bellette was a prominent Australian painter and art teacher who was known for her abstract and stylized paintings of classical and mythological subjects. She was born in Hobart, Tasmania, on 25 March 1908, the daughter of William Bellette, a jeweller, and Mary Ann Bellette, a dressmaker. She showed an early talent for drawing and painting and studied at the Hobart Technical College under Lucien Dechaineux from 1924 to 1927. She then moved to Sydney and enrolled at the East Sydney Technical College, where she met her future husband, Paul Haefliger, a Swiss-born painter and art critic. They married in 1932 and travelled to Europe together. Bellette was influenced by various artistic movements, such as cubism, surrealism and neo-classicism. She developed her own distinctive style of painting, using geometric forms, rich colours and symbolic imagery to create compositions inspired by ancient Greek and Roman art and literature. She also painted landscapes, still lifes and portraits, often incorporating elements of fantasy and allegory. She exhibited widely in Australia and abroad, winning several prizes and awards. She was a founding member of the Contemporary Art Society in 1939 and a member of the Society of Mural Decorators in 1941. She also taught painting at the East Sydney Technical College from 1944 to 1946. Bellette and Haefliger lived in various countries throughout their lives, including France, Spain, Greece, Italy and England. They also spent time in the United States, where Bellette had a solo exhibition at the Willard Gallery in New York in 1949. They returned to Australia in 1956 and settled in Hill End, New South Wales, where they became part of a vibrant artistic community that included Russell Drysdale, Donald Friend and Margaret Olley. Bellette continued to paint until her death on 16 March 1991 in London. She was cremated at the Highgate Cemetery and her ashes were scattered in Hill End. She left behind a large body of work that is now held by various public and private collections. She is regarded as one of the most original and influential figures in Australian modernism.