By Ashleigh Barraclough

Topic: Art

Thursday, June 25, 2026, at 5:36 am

The Royal Society of Tasmania is making a digital book of Owen Stanley's art.

In short:

The Royal Society of Tasmania is turning a unique collection of colonial maritime art into a digital book.

Owen Stanley was a British sailor who used watercolors to depict his 19th-century expeditions.

What's next?

The work will be available online to the public later this year.

The Royal Society of Tasmania got a rare piece of maritime history in 1900.

The society was worried that Tasmania would lose its heritage and history.

The society was donated an album of art by Owen Stanley.

He was a gifted artist and produced maps and charts for the Admiralty.

Owen Stanley depicts three boats, including the Britomart.

The album is valuable and unique but has been in storage due to its fragility.

The society applied for grant funding to conserve the album and turn it into a digital book.

Simon Olding from Full Gamut Gallery is photographing the album.

Capturing rare glimpses of Tasmanian history

The album depicts life in the places Stanley visited in the 19th century.

One work depicts a man struggling in the water after going overboard a ship.

There's a painting of a man beating off birds.

Owen Stanley wrote that the man had difficulty defending himself from albatross attacks.

The digital book will allow people to see Stanley's handwritten inscriptions next to the paintings.

If we didn't have Owen Stanley's explanation, we wouldn't understand the painting.

Another favorite is a painting of a timber cutting station in the bush on the Tasman Peninsula.

There are no existing images of that station.

Conserving, photographing, and digitizing the album

Art coordinator Marley Large is in charge of the Royal Society's artworks.

Marley Large coordinates the artworks owned by the Royal Society of Tasmania.

Stanley's collection is unique because of his ability to tell a story from the water.

He traveled inland and described the dogs guarding the peninsula to prevent prisoners from escaping.

He did drawings of the coal mines at Saltwater River and the inclined tramway.

Owen Stanley depicts the jetty and tramway at Saltwater River.

The society received a grant to conserve the album and turn it into a digital book.

Now they are making it into a flip book so people can access it online.

She hopes the work will allow the public to gain a broader understanding of Australia's maritime history.

The work is expected to be available online later this year.

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