As an artist, lecturer, broadcaster and educator, Vida Lahey contributed significantly to the development of art in Queensland. In Wintry sunshine, she has captured the distinctive attributes of Brisbane’s Albert Street Uniting Church, which casts dramatic shadows across the foreground of the painting.

Opened in 1889, the church was designed in the Victorian Gothic Revival style by architect GHM Addison for the then-Methodist congregation — and remains a defining feature of the city. Other discernible landmarks include the Old Windmill in Observatory Park, Spring Hill, and Craigston, Wickham Terrace’s eight-storey office and residential block, built in 1927.

In 1936, Wintry sunshine was included in an exhibition of Lahey’s work at the Union Trustees Chambers, Brisbane, with the critic for the Courier-Mail remarking on its ‘shadow pools’ and the artist’s capacity to depict ‘shade in exact relationship with brilliant lighting and architectural composition’.