The world of Wilfrid and Jane de Glehn is evocative of a lost Golden Age: a world of piano soirées, punting and picnics with people who wore striped blazers and muslin and looked good doing it. On the surface, their lives reflect this, both in their work and their travels together. They hailed from different, but overall similar backgrounds. Jane came from an old and highly talented New York family, whilst English-born Wilfrid was the handsome, bilingual, scion of a minor aristocratic European family. Both the Emmets and the de Glehns were liberal, intellectual, polymath and, while not exactly rich formed part of the socially fluid haute bourgeoisie, which before 1929, found no real challenge on either shore. But while their extravagant milieu might appear genteel, languid, even rarefied, their life together in England was something far more tangible and simple.
Jane and Wilfrid at Purtud, Switzerland, 1907
Wilfrid Gabriel de Glehn (1870-1951, born ‘von Glehn’) was born in Sydenham in Southeast London into a minor aristocratic family. Wilfrid studied art briefly at the Royal Academy Schools in South Kensington before going on to the École des Beaux-Arts in Paris, where for a time he lived with his French cousin, the artist Lucien Monod (1867-1957). In 1891, de Glehn was hired by John Singer Sargent (1856-1925) to assist him on the Boston Public Library mural project at Morgan Hall. It was while working on this project that de Glehn met American-born artist Jane Erin Emmet (1873-1961) in 1903, and they were married the following year.
After the wedding, the couple honeymooned in Cornwall before spending a period travelling around Europe, notably in Paris and Venice, where they were joined by Sargent, now a close friend of Wilfrid and Jane. After the honeymoon period had ended, the couple moved back to England and made a permanent home at 73 Cheyne Walk in Chelsea. London life for the de Glehns was busy and stimulating, both artistically and socially. Sargent would frequently visit the de Glehns’ Chelsea home, which became a gathering place for artists associated with the New English Art Club, such as Philip Wilson Steer and Henry Tonks. The de Glehns were also often invited to Hill Hall, the home of the society hostess, Mrs Charles Hunter. Here, their love of music and the theatre brought them many other friends, including the composers Roger Quilter and Percy Grainger, the actress Mrs Patrick Campell, and the Welsh painter and etcher Augustus John, who famously had a ménage à trois with bohemian Dorothy McNeil and artist Ida Nettleship. Wilfrid had come to public notice at the turn of the century very much as a protegee of Sargent, and he was now trying to build up a practice as a portrait painter himself, often using his London friends as subjects. De Glehn began showing his pictures not just at the RA and the NEAC but also in private galleries, such as the Goupil and the Carfax where he had several one-man shows.
In 1908 Wilfrid’s sister Rachel moved to Overshot Mill at Colne Engaine, on the border of Essex and Suffolk, with her husband Frank Marsh and their children. Without any children of their own, the de Glehns always maintained a close relationship with their nephews and nieces, and it was therefore through regular visits to see them that the artist first began painting in the area which had been made famous by the work of John Constable (1776-1837) in the early nineteenth century. From 1908, de Glehn painted a number of scenes depicting waterways around Essex and Suffolk, a few of which took for their subject the very buildings Constable had painted before him. In the below painting, Wilfrid lovingly depicts his sister’s home, set amongst idyllic countryside, and includes some of his young nephews and nieces who are seen feeding the chickens.
In the years following the First World War, de Glehn seemed determined to make the most of the English scene from which he had long been cut off, having worked in various roles throughout the war in France and Italy, including as an interpreter due to his fluency in French. In 1920, de Glehn and his wife went to stay at Cokes House at West Burton in Sussex, the home of a dear friend, the pianist, Leonard Borwick. It was here that Wilfrid was drawn to the medieval barns, as magnificent in his eyes as any cathedral, and he embarked on a series of paintings of haystacks.
Dashes of blue and mauves which de Glehn uses in the shadows as much as the subject matter itself, highlight Wilfrid’s awareness of, and interest in Impressionist painting on the continent. Wilfrid may have encountered Monet’s paintings of haystacks in Giverny at the mammoth show of Impressionist painting held at Paul Durand-Ruel’s gallery in London in 1905. Alternatively, a more direct and personal link also existed between Wilfrid and Giverny through Sargent whom he and Jane often visited there. Wilfrid’s skilful rendering of the humble haystack can be seen in direct relation to those captured by Monet. The serene atmosphere of this image is in part due to the perpendicular balance of the pictorial space, which is defined horizontally by the solid forms of the haystacks, and vertically by the dirt track that draws the eye up to the crest of the hill. Whilst Monet’s sole focus was the haystacks themselves, Wilfrid’s picture is a celebration of place, using minor identifying elements to indicate the Sussex landscape that he and Jane were very much in love with.
While the summer months were spent out of doors painting landscapes, de Glehn largely spent the cooler months inside where he focused on interior scenes. During the winter months, de Glehn also produced a high number of nude studies which were always in high demand. De Glehn used the sitting room at Cheyne Walk as an unofficial studio and the room’s furnishings appeared in many of his nude paintings, while the figures are often illuminated by light reflected from the river or the lit fireplace. In the present painting, in a trait much seen in the work of his friend and colleague, John Singer Sargent, he has developed the background to reflect the luxurious interior of his studio, with the model posing elegantly on his sofa, which has been lavishly adorned with chintz and long lengths of fabric bunched up around the body of the model. These contemporary scenes were generally more intimate than his decorative, classical pieces and De Glehn was able to execute these paintings with a speed that suggests they were often achieved in one sitting. The model in the below painting was one of Wilfrid’s most popular models, known as Barbara – not to be confused with the niece of Jane de Glehn, Barbara Tebbit – who modelled for a number of his paintings around 1930.
The onset of war in 1939 led to a period of uncertainty for Wilfrid and Jane. They had been away on their annual trip to France when war broke out and hesitated to return to London. Finally, the decision was taken out of their hands for the house in Cheyne Walk was destroyed in the Blitz and only a few paintings were rescued from the ruins. Luckily, they had been staying in Grantchester at the time, but the destruction of their home, coupled with the death or departure of many of their Chelsea friends, left little for them to return to. Their search for a new home took them to
Wiltshire and in 1941, they bought the Manor House at Stratford Tony, set amidst idyllic countryside. Wilfrid relished this new country life and became a keen angler but had no intention of setting down his paintbrushes. He built a studio on the grounds and took great pleasure in painting the Wiltshire countryside. One of its chief attractions for de Glehn was that a small trout stream, the Ebble, ran along the edge of the garden. De Glehn was to spend much of the next nine years before his death in 1951 either painting in the studio he had built on the grounds of the Manor House or, as is the case with the present painting, working outside directly in the local landscape.
Wilfrid Gabriel de Glehn RA NEAC (1870-1951)
The Golf Links, Midhurst, oil on canvas, 55 x 69 cm
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