Frank Hinder

Francis (Frank) Henry Critchley Hinder (1906–1992) was an award winning Australian painter, sculptor and art teacher who is also known for his camouflage designs in World War II.

Hinder was the fourth child of Dr. Henry Vincent Critchley Hinder and Enid Marguerite (née Pockley). He was born at the family home, a grand Italianate Victorian mansion named "Carleton", in Summer Hill, New South Wales. He attended his father's alma mater, Newington College (1916–1918), and then completed his education at Sydney Church of England Grammar School, where his mother's brothers had been foundation students. As an art student he was tutored by Antonio Dattilo Rubbo at the Royal Art Society of New South Wales and at the East Sydney Technical College. Rubbo had also been his art master at Newington. While travelling he pursued his training at the Art Institute of Chicago, New York School of Fine and Applied Art and at the Taos summer school.

In the mid-1930s he worked as a commercial artist in the United States and taught at the Child-Walker School of Fine Art, Boston. In 1930 he married artist Margel Harris and both returned to Sydney in 1934, working in theatre design, advertising and graphic art.

Working with William Dakin and the Sydney Camouflage Group, Hinder was seconded to the Camouflage Wing of the Royal Australian Engineers during World War II where he designed the Hinder Spider, a garnished conical frame for concealing a man, and dummy aircraft such as the Hindup.

After the war he took a teaching position at the East Sydney Technical College and then became head of the Art Department of Sydney Teachers' College (now part of the University of Sydney) from 1958 to 1964. In 1952 he was awarded the Blake Prize for Religious Art for his painting Flight into Egypt. As an artist he is best known for his abstract paintings, yet he also produced work across a diverse range of materials, including drawings and electric-light sculptures. He was a trustee of the Art Gallery of New South Wales and appointed as a Member of the Order of Australia. His work is held in many publics galleries including the Art Gallery of New South Wales, the Art Gallery of South Australia, the Australian National Gallery, the Australian War Memorial and the National Gallery of Victoria. He died at the age of 86 in 1992.