Luke Fildes
{{short description|English painter}}
{{for|his son, the British Olympic fencer|Luke Fildes (fencer)}}
{{Other people|Fildes|Fildes (surname)}}
{{EngvarB|date=February 2017}}
{{Use dmy dates|date=February 2017}}
{{Infobox person
| honorific_prefix = Sir
| name = Luke Fildes
| honorific_suffix = {{postnominals|size=100%|country=GBR|KCVO|RA}}
| image = Sir Luke Fildes RA (1843–1927) - Self Portrait - 03-718 - Royal Academy of Arts.jpg
| caption = Self-portrait, 1911
| birth_name = Samuel Luke Fildes
| birth_date = {{Birth date|df=yes|1843|10|03}}England & Wales, Civil Registration Birth Index, 1837-1915
| birth_place = Liverpool, England, United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland
| death_date = {{Death date and age|df=yes|1927|02|28|1843|10|03}}
| death_place = Kensington, London, England, United Kingdom
| occupation = Painter, illustrator
| nationality = British
| children = Luke Val Fildes, Paul Fildes
| parents = Mary Fildes
}}
Sir Samuel Luke Fildes {{postnominals|country=GBR|KCVO|RA}} (3 October 1843 – 28 February 1927){{Cite news|url=https://journals.lww.com/academicmedicine/Fulltext/2002/06000/SIR_LUKE_FILDES.12.aspx|title=SIR LUKE FILDES : Academic Medicine|work=LWW|access-date=18 September 2018|language=en-US}} was a British painter and illustrator born in Liverpool and trained at the South Kensington and Royal Academy Schools. He was the grandson of the political activist Mary Fildes.
Illustrator
File:Sir Luke Fildes - The widower - Google Art Project.jpg
At the age of 17, Fildes became a student at the Warrington School of Art. Fildes moved to the South Kensington Art School where he met Hubert von Herkomer and Frank Holl. All three men became influenced by the work of Frederick Walker, the leader of the social realist movement in Britain.
Fildes shared his grandmother's concern for the poor and in 1869 joined the staff of The Graphic newspaper, an illustrated weekly began and edited by the social reformer, William Luson Thomas. Fildes shared Thomas' belief in the power of visual images to change public opinion on subjects such as poverty and injustice. Thomas hoped that the images in The Graphic would result in individual acts of charity and collective social action.
Fildes' illustrations were in the black-and-white style popular in France and Germany during the era. He worked in a social realist style, compatible with the editorial direction of The Graphic, and focused on images depicting the destitute of London. The Graphic published an illustration completed by Fildes the day after Charles Dickens' death, showing Dickens' empty chair in his study; this illustration was widely reprinted worldwide, and inspired Vincent van Gogh's painting The Yellow Chair.{{cite book|last=Souter, Nick and Tessa|title=The Illustration Handbook: A guide to the world's greatest illustrators|year=2012|publisher=Oceana|isbn=978-1-84573-473-2|pages=26}}
In the first edition of The Graphic newspaper that appeared in December 1869, Luke Fildes was asked to provide an illustration to accompany an article on the Houseless Poor Act, a new measure that allowed some of those people out of work to shelter for a night in the casual ward of a workhouse. The picture produced by Fildes showed a line of homeless people applying for tickets to stay overnight in the workhouse. The wood-engraving, entitled Houseless and Hungry, was seen by John Everett Millais, who brought it to the attention of Charles Dickens. Dickens was so impressed that he immediately commissioned Fildes to illustrate his next novel, The Mystery of Edwin Drood; only six of a planned twelve instalments had been published, however, when Dickens' sudden death left the book unfinished.
Fildes' illustrations also appeared in other mass-circulation periodicals: Sunday Magazine, The Cornhill Magazine, and The Gentleman's Magazine. He also illustrated a number of books in addition to Dickens' Edwin Drood, such as Thackeray's Catherine (1894).
Painter
Fildes soon became a popular artist and by 1870 he had given up working for The Graphic and had turned his full attention to oil painting. He took rank among the ablest English painters, with The Casual Ward (1874), The Widower (1876), The Village Wedding (1883), An Al-fresco Toilette (1889); and The Doctor (1891), now in Tate Britain. He also painted a number of pictures of Venetian life and many notable portraits, among them portraits commemorating the coronation of King Edward VII and Queen Alexandra. He was elected an Associate of the Royal Academy (A.S.A.) in 1879, and a Royal Academician (R.A.) in 1887; and was knighted by King Edward VII in 1906.{{Cite web|url=http://www.london-gazette.co.uk/issues/27937/pages/5342/|title=The London Gazette, 3 August 1906}} In 1918, he was appointed as Knight Commander of the Royal Victorian Order (KCVO) by King George V.{{Cite web|url=http://www.london-gazette.co.uk/issues/30723/supplements/6532|title=Supplement to The London Gazette, 3 June 1918}} Fildes produced a large number of caricatures for Vanity Fair under the nom de crayon "ELF". He and Henry Woods were regarded as leaders of the Neo-Venetian school.
Personal life
In 1874 Luke Fildes married Fanny Woods, who was also an artist and the sister of Henry Woods.
Fildes' first son, Philip, died of typhoid in 1877. The image of the doctor at his son's side during the ordeal left a lasting memory of professional devotion that inspired Fildes' 1891 work The Doctor.{{cite web | url=http://www.tate.org.uk/servlet/ViewWork?cgroupid=999999961&workid=4277&searchid=12252&roomid=false&tabview=text&texttype=10/ | title=The Tate Collection | accessdate=29 December 2009}}
File:Sir Paul Fildes by Sir (Samuel) Luke Fildes.jpg in 1919]]
File:Luke Fildes Grave 2016.jpg]]
Luke Val Fildes was Olympic fencer, solicitor and company secretary. His later son, Sir Paul Fildes, was an eminent scientist. Another son had a distinguished naval career, Lieutenant Commander Denis Quentin Fildes (1889–1975). They also had one more son, Geoffrey, and a daughter, Phyllis.
Fildes died in 1927 and is buried in Brookwood Cemetery.
A blue plaque marks Fildes's former house, Woodland House, in Melbury Road, Kensington, next to William Burges's Tower House. His home was later owned by film director Michael Winner.{{cite book|author1=Christopher Hibbert Ben Weinreb|author2=John & Julia Keay|title=The London Encyclopaedia|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=xa0D0PqiwfEC&pg=PA539|accessdate=21 June 2012|date=9 May 2011|publisher=Pan Macmillan|isbn=978-0-230-73878-2|pages=539–|edition=3rd}}{{cite web| url=http://www.theartsdesk.com/visual-arts/interview-michael-winner-collecting-donald-mcgill|title=Interview: Michael Winner on collecting Donald McGill|date=8 June 2010 |publisher=The Arts Desk| accessdate=1 July 2012}}
Modern politics
File:The Doctor Luke Fildes crop.jpg, an 1891 portrait by Fildes]]
In 1949 Fildes' painting The Doctor (1891) was used by the American Medical Association in a campaign against a proposal for nationalised medical care put forth by President Harry S. Truman. The image was used in posters and brochures along with the slogan, "Keep Politics Out of this Picture" implying that involvement of the government in medical care would negatively affect the quality of care. 65,000 posters of The Doctor were displayed, which helped to raise public scepticism for the nationalised health care campaign.{{Cite journal |date=2022-07-01 |title=What Is Represented "Worthily" in Luke Fildes' The Doctor? |url=https://journalofethics.ama-assn.org/gallery/what-represented-worthily-luke-fildes-doctor |journal=AMA Journal of Ethics |language=en |volume=24 |issue=7 |pages=E697–713 |doi=10.1001/amajethics.2022.697 |pmid=35838401 |issn=2376-6980 |last1=Kao |first1=A. C. |s2cid=250560833 |doi-access=free }}
Gallery
Works by Fildes
Applicants for Admission to a Casual Ward.jpg|Applicants for Admission to a Casual Ward, smaller version of the 1874 painting, held by the Tate Gallery (after 1908)
Samuel Luke Fildes - A Venetian Flower Girl.jpg|A Venetian Flower Girl (1877)
Jessica - Samuel Luke Fildes.jpg|Jessica (1888)
Mrs Mary Venetia James, née Cavendish-Bentinck, by Samuel Luke Fildes.jpg|Mrs Mary Venetia James (1895)
Fildes Italian scene.jpg|Italian scene ({{circa|1900}}), Venice
Fildes Portrait.jpg|Portrait of a woman
Fildes Venetta.jpg|Venetta
Sir Luke Fildes RA (1843–1927) - The Mantilla - 03-879 - Royal Academy of Arts.jpg|The mantilla ({{circa|1927}})
Luke Fildes (1843–1927) - A Schoolgirl - 03-1339 - Royal Academy of Arts.jpg|A Schoolgirl (1887)
King Edward VII by Sir (Samuel) Luke Fildes.jpg|State portrait of Edward VII (1902)
File:QueenAlexandra.jpg|State portrait of Queen Alexandra, consort of Edward VII (1905)
King George V 1911.jpg|State portrait of George V (1911)
Related to Fildes
Sir (Samuel) Luke Fildes by Philip Alexius de László.jpg|Portrait of Luke Fildes by Philip de László (1914)
Luke Fildes00.jpg|Luke Fildes "ELF" by Spy
Woodland House 02.JPG|Woodland House
Woodland House 04.jpg|Blue plaque at Woodland House (placing his birth year one year later)
References
=Citations=
{{Reflist}}
=Bibliography=
- {{EB1911|wstitle=Fildes, Sir Luke|volume=10|page=339}}
- L. V. Fildes, Luke Fildes, R.A., A Victorian Painter (Michael Joseph, 1968)
External links
{{Commons category|Samuel Luke Fildes}}
- {{Art UK bio}}
- {{Gutenberg author | id=37514| name=Luke Fildes}}
- {{FadedPage|id=Fildes, Sir Samuel Luke|name=Samuel Luke Fildes (illustrator)|author=yes}}
- {{Internet Archive author |sname=Luke Fildes}}
- [http://www.thefamousartists.com/luke-fildes Sir Luke Fildes]
- [https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1880/03/16/98616837.pdf New York Times 1880]
- {{gutenberg|no=8941|name=Lord Kilgobbin by Charles James Lever}}
{{Authority control}}
{{DEFAULTSORT:Fildes, Luke}}
Category:Painters from Liverpool
Category:Artists' Rifles soldiers
Category:English genre painters
Category:19th-century English painters
Category:English male painters
Category:20th-century English painters
Category:Knights Commander of the Royal Victorian Order
Category:Vanity Fair (British magazine) artists
Category:Social realist artists
Category:20th-century English male artists