In 2003, a small space in the gallery was dedicated to her, and each year on her birthday, April 28, an exhibition is opened showing her work in a new context.
This year Aaron Kreisler and Robyn Notman have curated "Frances Hodgkins: The French Connection," an exhibition that looks at her paintings in the context of Intimism, a branch of French Impressionism dealing with quiet, domestic scenes, fleeting moments and simple, everyday situations.
"It looks at joie de vivre, everyday joy and pleasure and celebrating life's variety. There's intimacy as well as everyday subjects," says Notman.
The Impressionist sense of localised colour and plein air [open air] painting are combined with relaxed, momentary subject matter, she says.
The Hodgkins exhibition is also an opportunity to show related works by other artists from the collection that haven't been seen for a while so viewers can see them afresh and in a different context.
This exhibition includes Lamp and Flowers by Edward Le Bas and Henri Le Sidaner's La Table, Harmonie Verte.
"The Le Bas work is very intimate, bourgeoise in feel. It's an interior which is quite discreet in its nature, but has this zest for life and interest in decorative qualities and a bright palette," Kreisler says.
Le Sidaner's La Table, Harmonie Verte, a table with cloth, water jug, teapot, plates and flowers, and a curtain behind, is all in shades of green.
Notman shows a photograph of Frances Hodgkins and two of her pupils sitting at a similar table in France in 1912, from the gallery's publication : Frances Hodgkins: Femme du monde (2009).
The exhibition also includes a couple of recent acquisitions that haven't been seen in public before: Rhona Haszard's St Briac, Brittany which was given to the gallery in 2006 by Eileen Soper through her nephew, Donald Macdonald; and Lucien Pissarro's Landscape through Trees, Tilty Wood which the gallery bought last year.
Lucien (1863-1944) was the son of the French Impressionist Camille Pissarro (1830-1903) and this work had been in a private collection for some time.
They saw it in an auction catalogue in Auckland, Notman explains.
"We were struck by just what a beautiful work it was. It's very dynamic. We have another work by [Lucien] Pissarro which was bought in the 1980s to complement the works by the Impressionists that we have in our collection but which were not overly well-represented.
After the De Beers gave us the Monet [La Debâcle] in 1982, we faced the challenge of providing some ongoing context for that work and a number of things were bought.
"When Aaron and I saw this for sale in Auckland, we thought what a beautiful complement to the existing Pissarro. It's not often you get the chance to acquire another piece that relates aesthetically to one you have already," she says.
In the exhibition, it hangs beside a painting by Hodgkins entitled Through the Trees.
Kreisler says it feels as if they are set in similar landscapes with a view through the trees, but are different in style and structure.
The Pissarro was paid for with interest earned on bequests made to the gallery. The Le Bas was given to the gallery in 1966 by the Contemporary Art Society in London, and the Le Sidaner and Paul Signac's Port de Saint Tropez, which is also in the exhibition, came through the National Art Collections Fund, funding agencies in the UK which are no longer able to support former Commonwealth connections.
Like many artists of the time, Frances Hodgkins travelled extensively in France and the UK and even returned to New Zealand briefly. Notman thinks she must be one of the most itinerant New Zealand artists.
"There's this sense of movement. If you read her diaries, she is constantly on the move. She's basically homeless. She doesn't have a fixed place where she lives. She's always on the move looking for new subject matter and trying to survive."
While Hodgkins experimented with many styles and her work changed through her career, her lyrical lightness of touch, her sense of pattern and colour retained their impressionistic quality but remained her own.
Notman points out the pattern on a woman's apron in a The Market Place, France painted by Hodgkins in 1903, and how the brushwork and pattern are similar to those in her ebullient Mill House, Ponterwyd (1935) hanging opposite, although the paintings are very different in style and period.
Kreisler explains: "We are showing tangential connections - where artists are interested in the same concerns. We haven't chosen a Hodgkins' still life, for example, but the sense of lightness of touch, the fabric and interest in creating pattern - it's nice to see those sorts of elements."
Notman points to Hodgkins' Summer hanging at the entrance to the exhibition.
"It shows that joie de vivre, the love of life in this domestic situation, the pleasure of life - having a cup of tea and sharing these routine things."
Kreisler concludes:" It's the small things in life that are just as important as the much bigger expansive ideas. A still life can have as much meaning sometimes as an overly art historical painting."
See it
Frances Hodgkins: The French Connection opens at the Dunedin Public Art Gallery today and continues until April 15 next year.
