Anne Noble was born in Wanganui, New Zealand in 1954 and attended Elam School of Fine Arts, University of Auckland, graduating with a Master in Fine Arts in 1983. In 1982, in association with the Sarjeant Gallery, she mounted an exhibition of photographs of the Wanganui River and published The Wanganui in association with 'Photo-Forum'. Noble lived in London between 1985 and 1989, working for the Civic Trust and the Tidy Britain Group while making a documentary essay about an order of contemplative nuns. On her return to New Zealand in 1989, to take up the position as artist-in-residence at Tylee Cottage in Wanganui, the Sarjeant Gallery mounted an exhibition of this work, entitled 'In the Presence of Angels - Photographs of the Contemplative Life', which toured New Zealand during 1991 and 1992. The 12 works in the Queensland Art Gallery's Collection (Acc. nos 1993.346.001-012) have been isolated as a separate series from the exhibition of 57 photographs.

Prior to executing the 'In the presence of angels - photographs of the contemplative life' series Noble produced her Wanganui River (1980-82) photographs, (as a child the river ran adjacent to her parents' property) and 'Song ... without words' (1989-90), a contemplation of the beauty of the natural world and its poetic silences. Unlike the dark views of the river, white dominates this constructed tableau of swans. In the Convent suite, developed at the cloistered Tyburn Convent in London (1987-88), Noble treated light with particular emphasis as a metaphor for both divine illumination and the sanctifying power of prayer. From the panoramic format of the Wanganui views, Noble used black-and-white photography to serve aspects of the austere, ritualised life of a particular order of nuns. The sensibility of the panoramic is reflected in the frieze-like placement of the images when on display.