Vida Lahey’s still lifes afforded her the opportunity to experiment with pattern and colour in ways that could be accommodated within accepted standards and were recognised by her peers. Australian impressionist Arthur Streeton, for example, declared Lahey’s flower studies ‘an original step, and therefore a step in a new direction’. Her Art and nature 1934 – a watercolour featuring a bas relief plaster sculpted in the classical style by her friend Daphne Mayo, a burst of colour in the form of tangerine-hued Mexican sunflowers, and a book on renowned French modernist Henri Matisse – demonstrates Lahey’s synthesis of traditional and contemporary approaches.

In addition to their own work, Lahey and Mayo played leading roles in progressing art in Queensland. In 1929, they established the Queensland Art Fund, which raised funds towards the advancement of art, as Mayo described, ‘in every shape and form’. In the mid-1930s, the women worked tirelessly to secure the £10,000 needed to match the amount offered under the terms of the John Darnell Bequest, with £15,000 of the total going to the Queensland National Art Gallery (236 artworks have been acquired for the Collection with funds from this bequest).