Everard Group Artists

Edith and Bertha King were born in South Africa during the Anglo/Zulu wars, the daughters of an impetuous and hot-headed captain in the British army; they were raised by their mother and educated in England.  

At the turn of the century, they returned to South Africa as schoolteachers.  By 1905, Bertha had married Charles Everard, a well-respected owner of a lively and busy trading store on the transport wagon route to Lydenberg in the old Transvaal province.

On the farm Bonnefoi in the remote, bleak and vast expanses of the Eastern Highveld escarpment overlooking the Komati valley, Bertha supervised the design and construction of a large, stately and dignified home.  The baronial sized rooms displayed a strong influence of the British Arts and Crafts movement and were filled with furniture inspired by William Morris design.  Here she raised her three children Ruth, Rosamund and Sebastian Everard.  In later years the décor of the home would stretch to encompass the varied interests and tastes of the talented family and an exotic amalgamation of hunting trophies, African artefacts and Rosamund’s collection of North African and Egyptian treasures predominated.

Daily life on a South African farm in the early years of the twentieth century was very different to life in England and presented many difficulties to the educated, cultured and artistic Bertha. The rural community around her, African farm workers and local Boer farmers together with their families, did not share her European background and education, often causing her to feel culturally restricted and alienated. Despite her frustration and regular bouts of depression, Bertha's pioneering spirit enabled her to educate her children herself, supervise the working of the farmlands (a difficult task for a woman at the time), design and oversee the building of schools and churches for the African farm workers and their families - including a church for the local Anglican congregation in Carolina- and to create an artistic legacy as a pioneer of South African Modernism in painting. 

What was extraordinary about the Everard Group artists was their ability to produce powerful, innovative work on an isolated farm, far removed from the hub of urban centres. Despite the negative criticism they received from a conservative public, unwilling to accept modern styles, the Everard artists continued to work with courage and conviction. Their pioneering work exists as a legacy to the development of modern art in South Africa.

​