Who was William Strutt?
William Thomas Strutt (1825-1915) was born in Devon, England and trained in France and Britain as an artist and engraver. Strutt left France at the start of the 1848 revolutions. Two years later he emigrated to Melbourne where he worked as an engraver and painter.
Strutt witnessed a number of major events in the early life of the Victorian colony, including separation from New South Wales, the foundation of responsible government, the departure of the Burke and Wills expedition, the profound effects of the gold rushes on society, and of course the bushfire of 1851.
A founding member of the Victorian Society of Fine Arts, Strutt was disheartened by the prospect of supporting his family as an artist in Melbourne and, in 1862, returned to Britain. He continued to paint until his death in 1915 and exhibited a number of works influenced by colonial life.
Black Thursday - composition and materials
Strutt painted Black Thursday in England 13 years after the fire. His composition of the painting was based on contemporary sketches he made of incidents reported in first-hand accounts of the day.
Unlike Strutt's Melbourne paintings, which were robustly constructed with thick oil paints on chalk-based gesso, Black Thursday was painted in the manner of English artists of the time. The canvas is very fine and is primed with a thin layer of gesso. The paint layer is also very thin, the oil paint most probably diluted with organic solvents. In some places the pencil under-drawing can be seen.
Black Thursday finds a home
Strutt always intended that this large instructional work should be included in a public collection. The painting was displayed publicly soon after it was completed in London, but failed to find a buyer. James Smith, art critic for the Melbourne Argus newspaper, felt this was because it was 'thoroughly Australian'.
Black Thursday was eventually brought to Australia by Adelaide art dealer EJ Wivell, who toured it throughout the colonies. It was offered for sale to various public institutions, without success.
In the early 1900s the painting was bought by a private collector, and in 1954 it was sold at auction in Adelaide to the Public Library of Victoria (now the State Library of Victoria) for a modest sum (colonial art was unfashionable at the time). When the new La Trobe Library opened in 1965, the painting was placed on permanent display in the foyer.
In 1988, Black Thursday was included in the national touring exhibition Creating Australia: 200 Years of Art 1788-1988, as part of Australia's bicentennial celebrations. Afterwards, while major renovations were underway at the State Library of Victoria, the painting was loaned out and displayed at the National Gallery of Australia and the Art Gallery of Western Australia. It finally returned to the Library and has hung here in the Cowen Gallery since it opened in November 2003.
Temporary removal from display
Black Thursday is not currently on display in the Library's Cowen Gallery. As the painting had not been cleaned for at least 50 years and was significantly discoloured by layers of dirt and aged varnish, it was temporarily removed for conservation treatment in September 2006. It will be back on display in the Cowen Gallery in late 2007. | 
