Mary Gwendoline Salmond, also known as Gwen Salmond (1877–1958), was a 19th-century British artist. She was the daughter of Major General William Salmond and wife of Sir Matthew Smith.

Early life

Salmond was the daughter of Major General William Salmond and Lady Emma Mary H. Hoyle Salmond. She became an artist against the "strictly bourgeois plans" of her parents. Her siblings were Emma, Gladys, Geoffrey, and

John John is a common English name and surname: * John (given name) * John (surname) John may also refer to: New Testament Works * Gospel of John, a title often shortened to John * First Epistle of John, often shortened to 1 John * Secon ...

.Irish Art Auction.
Whytes. Retrieved 20 August 2014.

Education

Salmond studied at

Slade School of Art The UCL Slade School of Fine Art (informally The Slade) is the art school of University College London (UCL) and is based in London, England. It has been ranked as the UK's top art and design educational institution. The school is organised as ...

where her friends included

Gwen John Gwendolen Mary John (22 June 1876 – 18 September 1939) was a Welsh artist who worked in France for most of her career. Her paintings, mainly portraits of anonymous female sitters, are rendered in a range of closely related tones. Although s ...

and

Ursula Tyrwhitt Ursula Tyrwhitt (1872–1966) was an English painter and draughtsman. Biography Ursula Tyrwhitt was born in Nazeing, Essex and studied at the Slade School of Fine Art from 1893 to 1894 and also in 1911 and 1912. She also studied in Paris at the A ...

. Other students in the class of 1895, aside from Salmond and John, were

Ida Nettleship Ida Margaret Nettleship (24 January 1877 – 14 March 1907) was an English artist who is best known as the first wife of artist Augustus John. Biography Nettleship was born in Hampstead, the eldest of the three daughters of animal painter J ...

and Edna Waugh."Colourful Lives and Affairs of the Art: Portraits of Women."
''Times Higher Education. 4 September 1995. Retrieved 20 August 2014. She went to Paris in the winter of 1898-1899 with Nettleship and John to further their education. They studied at the

Académie Carmen Académie Carmen, also known as Whistler's School, was a short-lived Parisian art school founded by James McNeill Whistler. It operated from 1898 to 1901. History The school opened in October 1898 in a large house and stable at No. 6 Passage St ...

, where

James Abbott McNeill Whistler James Abbott McNeill Whistler (; July 10, 1834July 17, 1903) was an American painter active during the American Gilded Age and based primarily in the United Kingdom. He eschewed sentimentality and moral allusion in painting and was a leading pr ...

taught and Salmond paid John's fees. While there, the women made paintings of each other and self-portraits. Gwen John painted Nettleship and Salmond in ''Interior with Figures,'' which has been said to be "symbolic of modern Parisian life." Brian Louis Pearce and Nettleship lived in a flat on Rue Froidveau.

Augustus John Augustus Edwin John (4 January 1878 – 31 October 1961) was a Welsh painter, draughtsman, and etcher. For a time he was considered the most important artist at work in Britain: Virginia Woolf remarked that by 1908 the era of John Singer Sarg ...

, Gwen John's brother, said that these women were the "stars of his generation."

Marriage and children

Salmond met fellow artist Matthew Smith in 1907 in

Whitby Whitby is a seaside town, port and civil parish in the Scarborough borough of North Yorkshire, England. Situated on the east coast of Yorkshire at the mouth of the River Esk, Whitby has a maritime, mineral and tourist heritage. Its East Clif ...

and she became his "greatest mentor." In 1912, she married Smith and they had two sons together, Mark (1915–1940) and Dermot (1916–1941). Their marriage was not happy; he left her permanently in 1922 but they never divorced, and he was always a strong supporter of her work. It was Salmond who raised the boys. Smith left his wife and sons because he felt they were "stifling his career." Both sons served in the

Royal Air Force The Royal Air Force (RAF) is the United Kingdom's air and space force. It was formed towards the end of the First World War on 1 April 1918, becoming the first independent air force in the world, by regrouping the Royal Flying Corps (RFC) and ...

during

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

and were killed during the war.

Career

Her works were exhibited at

Leicester Galleries Leicester Galleries was an art gallery located in London from 1902 to 1977 that held exhibitions of modern British, French and international artists' works. Its name was acquired in 1984 by Peter Nahum, who operates "Peter Nahum at the Leiceste ...

Royal Academy The Royal Academy of Arts (RA) is an art institution based in Burlington House on Piccadilly in London. Founded in 1768, it has a unique position as an independent, privately funded institution led by eminent artists and architects. Its pur ...

and the

New English Art Club The New English Art Club (NEAC) was founded in London in 1885 as an alternative venue to the Royal Academy. It continues to hold an annual exhibition of paintings and drawings at the Mall Galleries in London, exhibiting works by both members and a ...

(NEAC). Her considerable skills as a draughtswoman made her much in demand as a teacher of drawing. Salmond taught at the Chelsea Art School, which was managed by her friends

and

William Orpen Major Sir William Newenham Montague Orpen, (27 November 1878 – 29 September 1931) was an Irish artist who worked mainly in London. Orpen was a fine draughtsman and a popular, commercially successful painter of portraits for the well-to-do in ...

from the Slade, London County Council and Clapham Art School.Chelsea Art School.
British and Irish Artists of the 20th Century. Retrieved 20 August 2014.

References

External links

Gwen Salmond
Collage, City of London {{DEFAULTSORT:Salmond, Gwen 1877 births 1958 deaths 20th-century British painters 20th-century British women artists Alumni of the Slade School of Fine Art Académie Carmen alumni