[6] She returned to Paris in 1932 and had a full year studying with Yadav Vytllayl and André Lhote's atelier.

[7] Stewart was a modernist painter,[8] influenced by European and British post-impressionist art, specifically Henri Matisse, Pablo Picasso, Fernand Léger, and the Camden Town artists.

While at studying with André Lhote she developed an appreciation for the theory of the Golden Section, the balancing of spatial and colour relationships.

[7] Stewart was a contemporary of Dorothy Kate Richmond, Frances Hodgkins, Madge Freeman, Elma Roach and Gwen Knight.

[16] Stewart was included in Anne Kirker's New Zealand Women Artists: a Survey of 150 Years.