Mary Edwell-Burke

• Name — Mary Edwell-Burke • Birth Name — Mary Edwards • Born — 19 June 1894 • Birthplace — Sydney, New South Wales, Australia • Died — 19 January 1988 • Place of death — Fiji • Field — Painting, Sculpture Mary Edwell-Burke (1894–1988), was an Australian painter and carver.

Edwell-Burke was born in Sydney on 19 June 1894. She was the half-sister of Bernice E. Edwell. She studied at the East Sydney Technical College. In the 1920s, she exhibited with the Royal Art Society as Mary Edwards, and was a finalist for the Archibald Prize in 1921 and 1922. From 1935-1945, she exhibited with the Australian Watercolour Institute as Mary Edwards. In 1944, Edwell-Burke, along with Joseph Wolinski, brought an unsuccessful legal action to overturn William Dobell's 1943 Archibald prize for his portrait, Mr Joshua Smith, claiming the image was more a caricature than a portrait. In 1945, her portrait of Dame Enid Lyons, was rejected as "unsatisfactory" by the Federal Government’s Historic Memorials Committee. Edwell-Burke subsequently moved to Fiji and changed her name from Mary Edwards to Mary Edwell-Burke. Edwell-Burke died in Fiji on 19 January 1988.