Explore the Background of this artwork.
Tom Wills is recognised as Australia's first multi-sports superstar, for he dominated cricket and was the primary catalyst behind the sport of Australian rules football. Born in 1835 in the British colony of New South Wales and raised in Victoria, Wills was sent to England in 1850 to attend Rugby School, where he became captain of the school cricket team and played a nascent form of rugby football. Returning home in 1856, Wills revolutionised Australian cricket and captained Victoria to repeated victories in intercolonial matches. In 1858 he called for the formation of a "foot-ball club" with a "code of laws" to keep cricketers fit during winter. The following year, he assisted in drawing up the laws from which Australian rules football evolved. He is regarded as one of the more complex and intriguing figures in Australian history, given his lifelong engagement with Indigenous Australians and the nature of his downfall.Wills posed for the portrait before the end of 1870. The artist, William Handcock, was born in Ireland and lived for a period in New Zealand before relocating to Melbourne. He died from tongue cancer soon after the portrait's completion.There is no recorded evidence of the portrait until 1923, when The Australasian reported that Test cricket great Hugh Trumble, then secretary of the Melbourne Cricket Club (MCC), purchased the painting (from whom is not stated) and donated it to the MCC.
cricket Indigenous Australians Cricket Victoria Melbourne Hugh Trumble intercolonial matches The Australasian Australian rules football Tom Wills Melbourne Cricket Club tongue cancer Rugby School rugby football the laws New South Wales fir Test cricket