Colonial lasses were expected to marry at 16, but she wanted to be an artist, not a wife, and she had big ambitions. She wanted to train with the best painters of her day in Europe, to elevate her sex, and to adorn her home town of Sydney with republican frescos.

Adelaide Ironside was the first locally-born female professional painter to leave the colonies to train abroad. She astonished the poet Robert Browning with her 'wild and enthusiastic ways', was mentored by John Ruskin, sold her work to the Prince of Wales, and won accolades in Rome and London as well as Paris and Sydney. Yet today she is largely forgotten.

In this poignant biography, historian Kiera Lindsey recreates Adelaide's life and her relationship with her mother Martha, who was her greatest supporter, but also hindered her from fully realising her ambitions. She reveals the romantic mysticism which infused Adelaide's life and work, as well as the way dramatic tensions in the art world ignited by the Pre-Raphaelites changed the course of Adelaide's art and career.