Welsh 1876-1939 Gwen John was born in Haverfordwest, Wales, the second of four children of Edwin William John and his wife Augusta (nee Smith). Edwin John was a solicitor whose dour temperament cast a chill over his family, and Augusta was often absent from the children due to ill health, leaving her two sisters??stern Salvationists??to take her place in the household. Despite the considerable tension in the family (who became known as "those turbulent Johns") the children's interest in literature and art was encouraged. Following the mother??s premature death in 1884, the family moved to Tenby in Pembrokeshire, Wales. Although she painted and drew from an early age, her earliest surviving work dates from her nineteenth year. From 1895?C98, she studied at the Slade School of Art, where her younger brother, Augustus John, had begun his studies in 1894. During this period they shared living quarters, and further reduced their expenses by subsisting on a diet of nuts and fruit. Even as a student, Augustus' brilliant draughtsmanship and personal glamour made him a celebrity, and stood in contrast to Gwen's quieter gifts and reticent demeanour. While he greatly admired her art, Augustus offered her advice which she ignored; he urged her to take a "more athletic attitude to life", and cautioned her against what he saw as the "unbecoming and unhygienic negligence" of her mode of living, but her entire life was marked by a disregard for her physical well-being. In 1898 she made her first visit to Paris with two friends from the Slade, and while there she studied under James McNeill Whistler at the Academie Carmen. She returned to London in 1899, and spent the next four years in austere circumstances. When she exhibited her work for the first time in 1900, at the New English Art Club (NEAC), her address was a derelict building where she was living illegally.  Related Paintings of Gwen John :. | The Convalescent | the artist in her room in paris | Napoleon Blair made plague in the house | The Precious Book | Self-Portrait |
Related Artists:
Levitan, Isaak
Russian Painter, 1860-1900 Russian painter of Lithuanian birth. He largely painted landscapes (including pastel sketches), which are noted for their emotive or symbolic resonance. His 'landscapes of mood' had a profound influence on Russian landscape painting, to which he introduced a sense of the unity of humankind and nature, and of the spiritual power of the Russian
Hermann August Cappelen
(1 May 1827 - 8 March 1852) was a Norwegian painter. Cappelen was best known for his melancholic, dramatic and romantic landscape compositions. Hermann August Cappelen was born in Skien, Norway. He was the son of Diderik von Cappelen (1795-1866) and Margaret Noble Severine Henriette Løvenskiold (1796-1866). Both the Løvenskiold and Cappelen families were prominent Norwegian family of merchants, land owners, civil servants and politicians. His family were the owners of prominent iron works and various other properties. His grandfather, Diderik von Cappelen (1761-1828), was member of the Norwegian Constituent Assembly at Eidsvoll in 1814. He grew up at Holden, a manor in Ulefoss in the Grenland district of the county of Telemark. After school graduation in Skien in 1845, he went to Christiania to take another exam at the University of Oslo. He subsequently went to Dusseldorf, where he studied with Hans Gude. Cappelen was a student at Kunstakademie Dusseldorf under Johann Wilhelm Schirmer in landscape painting class (1846-1850).
Edwin Roffe
British,fl.Mid-nineteenth century