Origin of Gallipoli art remains mystery

Anzac Cove as depicted in an oil painting by artist A.A. Forrester.

The rugged, scrub-covered hills are unmistakably those of Gallipoli's Anzac Cove. But who depicted them in an extremely rare, nearly century-old painting is a tantalising mystery that an Auckland art gallery director is battling to solve.

Jonathan Gooderham, managing director of Jonathan Grant Galleries in Parnell, bought the oil painting — dated 1918 — through Australian auctioneers Lawsons and has spent the past two months trying to uncover its history.

The work is signed A.A. Forrester, suggesting the artist might have been Oamaru artist Alfred Avery Forrester.

An Australian auction house which previously listed the work said Forrester was recruited as a reserve, and it was not known which regiment he served with at Gallipoli.

It was, however, known he was back in New Zealand in 1916, and in later life was an artist, with Oamaru naming its public art gallery after him.

But when Mr Gooderham bought the piece in what he called a "substantial investment", there was little information as to its history, previous owners or even confirmation that A.A. Forrester was indeed Alfred Avery Forrester.

"There are two of us working on it very hard, and also enlisting all of the outside work we can get," said Mr Gooderham, an expert in military art.

Mr Gooderham plans to feature the painting, which can be viewed in his gallery, in a catalogue alongside other World War I works by Nugent Welsh, Peter McIntyre and Josef Koreny.