Studio portrait of Ada Evans, the first Australian woman to obtain a law degree and the first woman admitted to the Bar in New South Wales. Sydney, circa 1905.

Gelatin silver print photograph, oval Paris Panel format, 190 x 140 mm, on the original card mount with the blind stamp of Swiss Studios, Sydney; in superb condition, with the original tissue guard preserved (lightly foxed) and still housed in the studio’s green card portfolio, 310 x 235 mm (sunned at edges).

Ada Emily Evans (1872–1947), barrister, was the first Australian woman to receive a law degree and the first woman admitted to the Bar in New South Wales.

Other copies of this beautiful portrait of her, taken by the Swiss Studios in Sydney around 1905, are held in the collection of the National Portrait Gallery, Canberra (2021.71), and the State Library of New South Wales (P1/2430).

Evans arrived with her family from England in 1883, when she was eleven. She attended Sydney Girls’ High and received a Bachelor of Arts degree from the University of Sydney in 1895. In 1899, with the encouragement of her mother, she returned to her alma mater to undertake a law degree, despite the fact that women were not yet permitted to practise law in Australia. (She managed to enrol in the course while the Dean was on sabbatical). Evans graduated LL.B. in 1902; the Supreme Court, however, rejected her application for registration as a student-at-law; similarly, her applications to be admitted to the Bar in New South Wales and in England were unsuccessful.

Evans earned a living for some time in journalism, as editor of the women’s pages of the Australian Star. It was not until after World War One – May 1919, in fact – that Ada was finally allowed to register as a student-at-law, following the passing of the Women’s Legal Status Act 1918 (NSW); and, on 12 May 1921, having completed the necessary two-year term, Evans was admitted to the Bar and became the first woman barrister in New South Wales. Having triumphed in her long political battle against patriarchal attitudes and prejudice, she now declined to practise, partly because of family commitments but also due to the fact that so much time had elapsed since her graduation.

Ada Evans was one of a select group of female legal pioneers in Australia, along with her contemporaries Flos Greig, who in 1905 become the first Australian woman to enter the legal profession when she was admitted as a barrister in Victoria; Sibyl Morrison, who in 1924 became the first woman to practise at the New South Wales Bar; and Marie Byles, who became New South Wales’ first female solicitor, in the same year.

From 1909 Evans resided with her brother and her widowed sister Florence and her children at “Kurkulla”, a large rural property in Bowral. Evans died at Kurkulla in December 1947.

Provenance: From the library of Ada Evans’ niece, Joan Kingdon, “Kurkulla”, which was purchased from Kingdon in 1996 by a previous owner; private collection, Queensland.