STAMP DESIGNER’S DOUBLE SUCCESS

Press, Volume CIX, Issue 32078, 28 August 1969, Page 2

STAMP DESIGNER’S DOUBLE SUCCESS

The English • born Christchurch artist, Miss Eileen Mayo, who designed six of the new stamps to be issued in New Zealand next year, has also had four designs accepted for the Cook Bi-Centenary Commemorative issue. “Having designs accepted for both these issues is a great honour and I am delighted about it,” she said yesterday. She declined to comment, however, on the designs she did for the Cook issue. A versatile artist who has exhibited in some of the world's famous galleries and the winner of many art prizes, Miss Mayo said she found stamp-designing a tremendous challenge. “A terrific amount of research has to be done, which is very satisfying,” she said. "Besides, stamps last. If you paint a picture only a few people see it, but stamps circulate. I hope the new ones bring a lot of pleasure to many people in New Zea-

■ land and in other countries.”! Miss Mayo did a series of six stamp designs in the' “Australian Mammals" series; issued from 1959 to 1962, and four in the “Great Barrier Reef" series issued tn Australia in 1966. But she is now having a break from stamps. “With the stamp competition over I am dying to get back to print-making,” she said. An artist who specialises in serigraphs (silk-screen prints) and relief prints, Miss Mayo has won many international prizes in this art form. Twenty-three of the prints she was invited to show at the Lugano Exhibition in Switzerland last year were sold. “With the formation of the New Zealand Print Council, hand-made prints are becoming very popular in New Zealand also, particularly in Auckland,” die said. Miss Mayo was awarded a Queen Elizabeth II Arts Council fellowship for specialist studies in printmaking In 1967. They included studies of recent trends in Australia and visits to art schools and galleries in Sydney, Adelaide and Melbourne. She is a member of the New Zealand Print Council, as well as the Society of Wood Engravers, London, and the Sydney Printmakers. Miss Mayo was born in Norwich. She trained at the Slade School, University of London, the Chelsea Polytechnic and the Academie Montmarte. Paris. During her career she has written and illustrated eight books oh natural science, including “The Story of Living Things,” of 320 pages. Included in the murals she has done is the 67-paneJ work, “Tree of the Invertebrates” in The Australian Museum, Sydney.

An exhibitor in the Royal Academy, London, and many other British and Australian galleries, Miss Mayo has had works bought by Die Victoria and Albert Museum, London, as well as by prominent galleries throughout Britain, the United States. New Zealand and Australia.

Tapestry and coin designs have also interested Eileen Mayo. One of her tapestry designs, “Echinoderms,” was woven by the Dovecote Studios, Edinburgh, and was chosen with two others to represent modern tapestries at an historical exhibition in the 1982 Festival of Britain. In 1964 Miss Mayo was one of six artists commissioned by the Australian Treasury to submit designs for decimal coinage. The New Zealand Treasury also invited her to to submit designs for the same purpose. Since 1950 Eileen Mayo has given much time to teaching. She has lectured at the St Martins School of Art and the Sir John Cass College, both in London. When she went to Australia she was appointed to the staff of the National Art School, Sydney, and remained there for five years. She now teaches drawing at the School of Fine Arts, UniIversity of Canterbury.