Mark Gertler (painter)

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standing, left to right: Mark Gertler, Hewy Levy , Walter J. Turner , Edward Arthur Milne ; seated, left to right: Ralph Hodgson , JWN Sullivan and SS Koteliansky . London, 1928

Mark Gertler (born December 9, 1891 in Spitalfields , † June 23, 1939 in London ) was a British painter .

Life

Mark Gertler was the son of a Jewish-Austrian emigrant family . With a scholarship he was able to study at the renowned Slade School of Fine Art from 1908 to 1912. During his student years he painted many portraits of his family, most of them of his mother Golda. During his studies he met Paul Nash , Edward Wadsworth , Christopher Nevinson , Stanley Spencer and Phyllis Gardner , among others . Gertler found a soul mate in the eccentric painter Dora Carrington .

Ottoline Morrell: Portrait of Mark Gertler, pencil drawing, around 1909–1911

Gertler found an important patron in Lady Ottoline Morrell ; she introduced him to Walter Sickert , co-founder of the Camden Town Group . Soon afterwards he had great success as a portrait painter for the London Society and became a member of the New English Art Club . But his spirited manner and devotion to promoting his work, according to his own version, led to heightening personal frustration. In 1914, the art patron Edward Marsh took on the young painter as a mentor ; the relationship between the two men soon proved difficult. Two years later, Gertler, a staunch pacifist , ended his collaboration with Marsh - as his former sponsor was the private secretary of the future Prime Minister Winston Churchill and the patron of several war poets .

In the early 1920s, Gertler was diagnosed with tuberculosis and his doctor often advised him to stay in the sanatorium . His illness increasingly influenced his later works. In the years that followed, two of his closest friends, Katherine Mansfield and DH Lawrence , died from the same illness. In 1930, Mark Gertler married Marjorie Hodgkinson in Bath , and the relationship resulted in a son, Luke (* 1932). At the same time he became a part-time teacher at the Westminster School of Art in London. In the later years he was barely able to sell pictures and his last exhibition was mocked by art critics. Shortly afterwards, Mark Gertler committed suicide in his studio.

literature

  • Gertler, Mark . In: Hans Vollmer (Hrsg.): General Lexicon of Fine Artists of the XX. Century. tape 2 : E-J . EA Seemann, Leipzig 1955, p. 232-233 .
  • Sarah Macdougall: Mark Gertler . John Murray Publishers 2004, ISBN 978-0-7195-5799-6 .

Web links

Commons : Mark Gertler  - Collection of images, videos and audio files