John Roddam Spencer Stanhope (20 January 1829 – 2 August 1908) was an English artist associated with
Edward Burne-Jones
Sir Edward Coley Burne-Jones, 1st Baronet, (; 28 August, 183317 June, 1898) was a British painter and designer associated with the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood which included Dante Gabriel Rossetti, John Millais, Ford Madox Brown and Holman Hun ...
and
George Frederic Watts
George Frederic Watts (23 February 1817, in London – 1 July 1904) was a British painter and sculptor associated with the Symbolist movement. He said "I paint ideas, not things." Watts became famous in his lifetime for his allegorical work ...
and often regarded as a second-wave
pre-Raphaelite
The Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood (later known as the Pre-Raphaelites) was a group of English painters, poets, and art critics, founded in 1848 by William Holman Hunt, John Everett Millais, Dante Gabriel Rossetti, William Michael Rossetti, James ...
. His work is also studied within the context of
Aestheticism
Aestheticism (also the Aesthetic movement) was an art movement in the late 19th century which privileged the aesthetic value of literature, music and the arts over their socio-political functions. According to Aestheticism, art should be pro ...
and British
Symbolism
Symbolism or symbolist may refer to:
Arts
* Symbolism (arts), a 19th-century movement rejecting Realism
** Symbolist movement in Romania, symbolist literature and visual arts in Romania during the late 19th and early 20th centuries
** Russian sy ...
. As a painter, Stanhope worked in
oil
An oil is any nonpolar chemical substance that is composed primarily of hydrocarbons and is hydrophobic (does not mix with water) & lipophilic (mixes with other oils). Oils are usually flammable and surface active. Most oils are unsaturated ...
,
watercolor
Watercolor (American English) or watercolour (British English; see spelling differences), also ''aquarelle'' (; from Italian diminutive of Latin ''aqua'' "water"), is a painting method”Watercolor may be as old as art itself, going back to t ...
,
fresco
Fresco (plural ''frescos'' or ''frescoes'') is a technique of mural painting executed upon freshly laid ("wet") lime plaster. Water is used as the vehicle for the dry-powder pigment to merge with the plaster, and with the setting of the plaste ...
,
tempera
Tempera (), also known as egg tempera, is a permanent, fast-drying painting medium consisting of colored pigments mixed with a water-soluble binder medium, usually glutinous material such as egg yolk. Tempera also refers to the paintings done ...
, and
mixed media
In visual art, mixed media describes artwork in which more than one medium or material has been employed.
Assemblages, collages, and sculpture are three common examples of art using different media. Materials used to create mixed media art incl ...
. (Some of his oil paintings are mistaken for tempera.) His subject matter was
mythological
Myth is a folklore genre consisting of narratives that play a fundamental role in a society, such as foundational tales or origin myths. Since "myth" is widely used to imply that a story is not objectively true, the identification of a narrat ...
,
allegorical
As a literary device or artistic form, an allegory is a narrative or visual representation in which a character, place, or event can be interpreted to represent a hidden meaning with moral or political significance. Authors have used allegory th ...
,
biblical
The Bible (from Koine Greek , , 'the books') is a collection of religious texts or scriptures that are held to be sacred in Christianity, Judaism, Samaritanism, and many other religions. The Bible is an anthologya compilation of texts of a ...
, and contemporary. Stanhope was born in Yorkshire, England, and died in
Florence
Florence ( ; it, Firenze ) is a city in Central Italy and the capital city of the Tuscany region. It is the most populated city in Tuscany, with 383,083 inhabitants in 2016, and over 1,520,000 in its metropolitan area.Bilancio demografico an ...
, Italy. He was the uncle and teacher of the painter
Evelyn De Morgan
Evelyn De Morgan (30 August 1855 – 2 May 1919), née Pickering, was an English painter associated early in her career with the later phase of the Pre-Raphaelite Movement, and working in a range of styles including Aestheticism and Symbolis ...
.
Life and career
Stanhope was the son of
John Spencer Stanhope of
Horsforth
Horsforth is a town and civil parishes in England, civil parish within the City of Leeds, in West Yorkshire, England, lying about five miles north-west of Leeds city centre. Historically a village within the West Riding of Yorkshire, it had a p ...
and
Cannon Hall
Cannon Hall is a country house museum located between the villages of Cawthorne and High Hoyland some 5 miles (8 km) west of Barnsley, South Yorkshire, England. Originally the home of the Spencer and later the Spencer-Stanhope family, it ...
, a classical antiquarian who in his youth explored Greece. The artist’s mother was Elizabeth Wilhemina Coke, third and youngest daughter of
Thomas William Coke
Thomas William Coke, 1st Earl of Leicester (6 May 175430 June 1842), known as Coke of Norfolk or Coke of Holkham, was a British politician and agricultural reformer. Born to Wenman Coke, Member of Parliament (MP) for Derby, and his wife Elizab ...
of
Norfolk
Norfolk () is a ceremonial and non-metropolitan county in East Anglia in England. It borders Lincolnshire to the north-west, Cambridgeshire to the west and south-west, and Suffolk to the south. Its northern and eastern boundaries are the No ...
, first
Earl of Leicester
Earl of Leicester is a title that has been created seven times. The first title was granted during the 12th century in the Peerage of England. The current title is in the Peerage of the United Kingdom and was created in 1837.
Early creations ...
; she and her sisters had studied art with
Thomas Gainsborough
Thomas Gainsborough (14 May 1727 (baptised) – 2 August 1788) was an English portrait and landscape painter, draughtsman, and printmaker. Along with his rival Sir Joshua Reynolds, he is considered one of the most important British artists of ...
. Stanhope had one older brother, Walter, who inherited
Cannon Hall
Cannon Hall is a country house museum located between the villages of Cawthorne and High Hoyland some 5 miles (8 km) west of Barnsley, South Yorkshire, England. Originally the home of the Spencer and later the Spencer-Stanhope family, it ...
, and four sisters, Anna Maria Wilhelmina, Eliza Anne, Anne Alicia, and Louisa Elizabeth. Anna married Percival Pickering and became the mother of
Evelyn.
Not inheriting the family estates left Stanhope free to make a commitment to art. While a student at Oxford, he sought out Watts as a teacher and was Watts’ assistant for some of his architectural paintings. Spencer-Stanhope traveled with Watts to Italy in 1853 and to
Asia Minor
Anatolia, tr, Anadolu Yarımadası), and the Anatolian plateau, also known as Asia Minor, is a large peninsula in Western Asia and the westernmost protrusion of the Asian continent. It constitutes the major part of modern-day Turkey. The re ...
in 1856–57. Upon his return, he was invited by
Dante Gabriel Rossetti
Gabriel Charles Dante Rossetti (12 May 1828 – 9 April 1882), generally known as Dante Gabriel Rossetti (), was an English poet, illustrator, painter, translator and member of the Rossetti family. He founded the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhoo ...
to participate in the
Oxford Union murals
The Oxford Union murals (1857–1859) are a series of mural decorations in the Oxford Union library building. The series was executed by a team of Pre-Raphaelite artists including Dante Gabriel Rossetti, William Morris and Edward Burne-Jones. T ...
project, painting ''Sir Gawaine and the Damsels''.
![John Roddam Spencer Stanhope - Love and the Maiden](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/b/b9/John_Roddam_Spencer_Stanhope_-_Love_and_the_Maiden.jpg)
On 10 January 1859 he married Elizabeth King, the daughter of John James King, granddaughter of the third
Earl of Egremont
Earl of Egremont was a title in the Peerage of Great Britain. It was created in 1749, along with the subsidiary title Baron of Cockermouth, in Cumberland, for Algernon Seymour, 7th Duke of Somerset, with remainder to his nephews Sir Charles Wy ...
, and the widow of George Frederick Dawson. They settled in Hillhouse,
Cawthorne
Cawthorne is a village and civil parish in the Metropolitan Borough of Barnsley, South Yorkshire, England. The village was once a centre of the iron and coal mining industry; today it is part of an affluent commuter belt west of Barnsley. A ...
, and had one daughter, Mary, in 1860. That same year, Spencer-Stanhope’s house
Sandroyd (now part of
Reed's School
Reed's School is an independent secondary boarding school for boys with a mixed sixth form located in Cobham, Surrey, England. There are currently around 700 day pupils (620 boys, 80 girls) with 100 full-time boarders (80 boys, 20 girls). The s ...
), near
Cobham in
Surrey
Surrey () is a ceremonial and non-metropolitan county in South East England, bordering Greater London to the south west. Surrey has a large rural area, and several significant urban areas which form part of the Greater London Built-up Area. ...
, was commissioned from the architect
Philip Webb
Philip Speakman Webb (12 January 1831 – 17 April 1915) was a British architect and designer sometimes called the Father of Arts and Crafts Architecture. His use of vernacular architecture demonstrated his commitment to "the art of common ...
. Finished by 1861, Sandroyd was only Webb’s second house, the first having been built for
William Morris
William Morris (24 March 1834 – 3 October 1896) was a British textile designer, poet, artist, novelist, architectural conservationist, printer, translator and socialist activist associated with the British Arts and Crafts Movement. He ...
. The house was designed to accommodate Stanhope’s work as a painter, with two second-floor
studio
A studio is an artist or worker's workroom. This can be for the purpose of acting, architecture, painting, pottery (ceramics), sculpture, origami, woodworking, scrapbooking, photography, graphic design, filmmaking, animation, industrial design ...
s connected by double doors, a waiting room, and a dressing room for
models
A model is an informative representation of an object, person or system. The term originally denoted the plans of a building in late 16th-century English, and derived via French and Italian ultimately from Latin ''modulus'', a measure.
Models c ...
. The fireplace featured figurative
tiles
Tiles are usually thin, square or rectangular coverings manufactured from hard-wearing material such as ceramic, stone, metal, baked clay, or even glass. They are generally fixed in place in an array to cover roofs, floors, walls, edges, or o ...
designed by Burne-Jones based on
Chaucer’s dream-vision poem ''
The Legend of Good Women
''The Legend of Good Women'' is a poem in the form of a dream vision by Geoffrey Chaucer during the fourteenth century.
The poem is the third longest of Chaucer's works, after ''The Canterbury Tales'' and ''Troilus and Criseyde'', and is possib ...
''. For a person of Stanhope’s social standing, the house was considered “a modest artist’s dwelling.” Burne-Jones was a frequent visitor to Sandroyd in the 1860s, and the landscape furnished the background for his painting ''
The Merciful Knight
''The Merciful Knight'' is a watercolour by the pre-Raphaelite artist Edward Burne-Jones which was completed in 1863 and is currently housed at the Birmingham Museum & Art Gallery.
History
This picture is based on an 11th-century legend retold ...
'' (1864), the design of which Stanhope’s ''I Have Trod the Winepress Alone'' is said to resemble.
The move was intended to offer an improved environment for Stanhope’s chronic
asthma
Asthma is a long-term inflammatory disease of the airways of the lungs. It is characterized by variable and recurring symptoms, reversible airflow obstruction, and easily triggered bronchospasms. Symptoms include episodes of wheezing, cou ...
. When his condition was not alleviated, he turned to wintering in Florence. In the summers, he at first stayed at Burne-Jones’s house in London and later at the Elms, the western half of Little Campden House on
Campden Hill
Campden Hill is a hill in Kensington, West London, bounded by Holland Park Avenue on the north, Kensington High Street on the south, Kensington Palace Gardens on the east and Abbotsbury Road on the west. The name derives from the former ''Campde ...
, the eastern half of which was occupied by
Augustus Egg
Augustus Leopold Egg RA (2 May 1816, in London – 26 March 1863, in Algiers) was a British Victorian artist, and member of The Clique best known for his modern triptych '' Past and Present'' (1858), which depicts the breakup of a middle-class ...
.
In 1867, at the age of seven, Mary died of
scarlet fever
Scarlet fever, also known as Scarlatina, is an infectious disease caused by ''Streptococcus pyogenes'' a Group A streptococcus (GAS). The infection is a type of Group A streptococcal infection (Group A strep). It most commonly affects childr ...
and was buried in at the
English Cemetery in Florence. Her father designed her headstone.
![John Roddam Spencer Stanhope - Robin of Modern Times](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/78/John_Roddam_Spencer_Stanhope_-_Robin_of_Modern_Times.jpg)
Though his family accepted his occupation as a painter and took a great interest in art, Evelyn’s parents disparaged the achievements of “poor Roddy” and regarded the painters with whom he associated as “unconventional.” Considered among the
avant-garde
The avant-garde (; In 'advance guard' or ' vanguard', literally 'fore-guard') is a person or work that is experimental, radical, or unorthodox with respect to art, culture, or society.John Picchione, The New Avant-garde in Italy: Theoretical ...
of the 1870s, Stanhope became a regular exhibitor at the
Grosvenor Gallery
The Grosvenor Gallery was an art gallery in London founded in 1877 by Sir Coutts Lindsay and his wife Blanche. Its first directors were J. Comyns Carr and Charles Hallé. The gallery proved crucial to the Aesthetic Movement because it provided ...
, the alternative to the
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 ...
.
Stanhope moved permanently to Florence in 1880. There he painted the
reredos
A reredos ( , , ) is a large altarpiece, a screen, or decoration placed behind the altar in a church. It often includes religious images.
The term ''reredos'' may also be used for similar structures, if elaborate, in secular architecture, for ex ...
of the English Church, and other work in the Chapel of Marlborough College. In 1873, he bought the Villa Nuti in Florence, where he was visited frequently by De Morgan and where he lived until his death.
De Morgan’s sister,
A.M.W. Stirling
Anna Marie Diana Wilhelmina Stirling (née Pickering; 26 August 1865 – 11 August 1965), also known as Wilhelmina Stirling and under the alias Percival Pickering, was a British writer and art collector. A greater part of her books dealt with the ...
, wrote a collection of biographical essays called ''A Painter of Dreams,'' including reminiscences of her uncle, “the Idealist, the seer of exquisite visions.” During the 19th and early 20th century, the extended
Spencer-Stanhope family
Spencer-Stanhope is the family name of British landed gentry who for 200 years held Cannon Hall, a country house in South Yorkshire that since the 1950s has been a museum. The hyphenated form of the name is more common in British orthography, ...
included several artists, whose ties were the theme of a 2007 exhibition, ''Painters of Dreams'', part of the 50th anniversary celebration of the opening of Cannon Hall to the public as a museum. Featured were paintings by Stanhope and De Morgan, along with ceramics by her husband,
William De Morgan
William Frend De Morgan (16 November 1839 – 15 January 1917) was an English potter, tile designer and novelist. A lifelong friend of William Morris, he designed tiles, stained glass and furniture for Morris & Co. from 1863 to 1872. His tiles ...
; bronzes by
Gertrude Spencer-Stanhope; and the ballroom at
Cannon Hall
Cannon Hall is a country house museum located between the villages of Cawthorne and High Hoyland some 5 miles (8 km) west of Barnsley, South Yorkshire, England. Originally the home of the Spencer and later the Spencer-Stanhope family, it ...
and “Fairyland” in the pleasure grounds, which were designed by Sir Walter and his daughter Cecily.
Works
![Morgan Le Fay by Spencer Stanhope](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/6/62/Morgan_Le_Fay_by_Spencer_Stanhope.jpg)
Paintings and other works by John Roddam Spencer Stanhope include:
*''Penelope'' (1849)
*''Sir Gawaine and the Damsels at the Fountain'' (1857), Oxford murals
*''
Thoughts of the Past'' (1859)
*''Robins of Modern Times'' (c. 1860;
Collection of Ann and Gordon Getty)
*''Juliet and Her Nurse'' (exhibited at the Royal Academy 1863)
*''The Wine Press'' (1864)
*''Our Lady of the Water Gate'' (1870)
*''Procris and Cephalus'' (exhibited at the Royal Academy and Liverpool 1872)
*''
Love and the Maiden
''Love and the Maiden'' is an oil painting (previously mistaken for tempera) on canvas by English Pre-Raphaelite artist John Roddam Spencer Stanhope (executed in 1877) that is currently housed at the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco.
Histo ...
'' (exhibited at the Grosvenor Gallery 1877, now in the collections of the California Palace of the Legion of Honor Art Museum, San Francisco)
*''Night'' (1878)
*''The Waters of Lethe by the Plains of Elysium'' (1879–80)
*''Morgan Le Fay'' (c. 1880)
*''The Shulamite'' (c. 1882)
*
''Charon and Psyche'' (c. 1883)
*''Winnowing'' (exhibited Royal Inst. of Painters in Water Colours 1884)
*''Why Seek Ye the Living Among the Dead?'' (c. 1886; also known as ''Resurrection'')
*''Eve Tempted'' (1887)
*''The Pine Woods of Viareggio'' (exhibited 1888)
*''In Memoriam'' (exhibited New Gallery 1889) “in which a barefoot country girl suggestively smiles at the dead or wounded bird she caresses in her hand”
*''Flora'' (1889)
*Holy Trinity Main Altar Polyptych (1892–1894)
*Holy Trinity Memorial Chapel Polyptych (1892–1894)
*''The Escape'' (''c.'' 1900)
*''The Vision Of Ezekiel: The Valley Of Dry Bones'' (exhibited Royal Academy 1902)
Other works (dates unavailable):
*''Andromeda''
*''Autumn''
*''Charcoal Thieves''
*''Cupid and Psyche''
*''Love Betrayed'' (The Russell Cotes Gallery, Bournemouth)
*''The Millpond'' (watercolor with
bodycolor
Gouache (; ), body color, or opaque watercolor is a water-medium paint consisting of Pigment, natural pigment, water, a binding agent (usually gum arabic or dextrin), and sometimes additional Chemically inert, inert material. Gouache is designe ...
)
[“A Checklist of Pre-Raphaelite Works of Art in the Huntington Library and Art Collections,” ''Huntington Library Quarterly'' 55 (1992), p. 251.]
*''Patience On A Monument Smiling At Grief''
*''The Washing Place''
*''The White Rabbit''
References
External links
John Roddam Spencer Stanhope, artist(Victorian Art in Britain)
''John Roddam Spencer Stanhope'' by Lewis Carroll (National Portrait Gallery)*"John Roddam Spencer Stanhope and the Tomb of His Daughter Mary
by Nic Peeters and Judy Oberhausen
*
{{DEFAULTSORT:Stanhope, John Roddam Spencer
1829 births
19th-century English painters
English male painters
20th-century English painters
Pre-Raphaelite painters
Artists' Rifles soldiers
1908 deaths
People from Horsforth
Artists from Leeds
20th-century English male artists
19th-century English male artists