Victorian gold
The gold rush and its impact on cultural life

Born England 1825, active Australia 1850–62, died England 1915

William Strutt studied extensively in France and England before arriving in Victoria in July 1850. With little demand for the figure and history paintings for which he was trained, he found employment as an illustrator on the short-lived Illustrated Australian Magazine, published by Thomas Ham.

In February 1852, Strutt joined the tide of men travelling to the gold-fields of Ballarat, where he remained for eighteen months with little success.

He returned to Melbourne in mid-1853 and was actively involved in the city’s cultural scene, completing several portrait commissions and acting as a founding member of the Victorian Society of Fine Arts.

In 1855 he departed for New Zealand, returning to Melbourne the next year.

He left the colony of Victoria in 1862 for England where he completed two major works based on Australian sketches, Black Thursday, February 6th 1851 and Bushrangers, Victoria, Australia, 1852.

During his time in Victoria, Strutt recorded many of the significant events which shaped the colony including the bushfires of 1851, the political separation of Victoria from New South Wales and the departure of the Burke and Wills expedition.