Walter Langley
{{Short description|English painter (1852–1922)}}
{{for|the New York politician|Walter B. Langley}}
{{Use dmy dates|date=November 2019}}
File:Walter Langley autograph.png members' register; in his own hand. Dated 1884 and with an initialled post-1910 postage stamp.]]
File:Walter Langley - Between The Tides 1901.jpg
Walter Langley (8 June 1852 – 21 March 1922) was an English painter and founder of the Newlyn School of plein air artists.
Biography
He was born in Birmingham and his father was a journeyman tailor.1861 Census, RG9; Piece: 2136; Folio: 72; Page: 8 At 15 he was apprenticed to a lithographer. At 21 he won a scholarship to South Kensington and he studied designing there for two years. The sometimes highly ornate work is mainly in gold and silver and in a Renaissance style. He returned to Birmingham but took up painting full-time, and in 1881 was elected an Associate of the Royal Birmingham Society of Artists (RBSA). In the same year he was offered £500 for a year's work by the Birmingham-based photographer Robert White Thrupp (1821–1907). With this money he and his family moved to Newlyn where he was one of the first artists to settle and began recording the life of the fishing community.{{cite book|last1=Flynn|first1=Brendan|title=A Place for Art: The Story of the RBSA|date=2014|publisher=The Royal Birmingham Society of Artists|isbn=978-0-9930294-0-0}}
Politically left wing for his era, he was noted for his social realist portrayals of working class figures, particularly fishermen and their families. He was a supporter of Charles Bradlaugh, a radical socialist politician. His own working-class background enabled him to identify with the villagers and the hardships they endured, many of his paintings reflect this sympathy with the working-class fisher-folk amongst whom he lived. One of the best known works is the watercolour For Men Must Work and Women Must Weep (1883; Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery) based on Charles Kingsley's poem The Three Fishers (1851). Another is Between The Tides (1901; Warrington Museum & Art Gallery). News of the Missing was shown at the Royal Academy in 1884 and sold to an unnamed buyer for £250.{{cite news |title=A Picture Painted at Newlyn Well Sold |work=The Cornishman |issue=348 |date=19 March 1885 |page=4}}
Although one of the first to settle in the Newlyn artists' colony Newlyn School, Langley initially benefited little from its growing fame, partly because of his working-class origins and partly because until 1892 he painted largely in watercolour rather than the more prestigious medium of oils.Fox, Caroline and Greenacre, Francis, "Walter Langley", Painting in Newlyn 1880–1930, London, Barbican Art Gallery, 1985, pp 62–65 His early training in lithography gives his paintings a detail and texture that show his technical skills. On 12 March 1881 Langley was elected an associate member of the Royal Birmingham Society of Artists. Birmingham Daily Post, 21 March 1881, p. 5.
In 1884, Langley was elected a member of the RBSA and continued to exhibit widely throughout the UK and abroad. Later in his career his reputation grew. Langley's In Faith and Hope the World Will Disagree was singled out as "a beautiful and true work of art" by Leo Tolstoy in his book What is Art?,Tolstoy, Leo, [http://www.cyberspacei.com/jesusi/authors/tolstoy/art/wia.htm#_ednref99 What is Art] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20081122124854/http://cyberspacei.com/jesusi/authors/tolstoy/art/wia.htm |date=2008-11-22 }}, (Translated by Richard Pevear and Larissa Volokhonsky) while in 1895 Langley was invited by the Uffizi to contribute a self-portrait to hang alongside those of Raphael, Rubens and Rembrandt in their collection of portraits of great artists. Today his work is considered "vital to the image of the Newlyn School" and "alongside Stanhope Forbes ... the most consistent in style and substantial in output."
Langley's Motherless was selected for the Royal Academy's Summer Exhibition in 1894 and well received.{{cite web|title=Cornwall's fishing industry 1880-1900 as portrayed by the Newlyn painters|url=https://www.bsjwtrust.co.uk/wp/wp-content/uploads/Fishing-By-Newlyn-Painters.pdf|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230523100810/https://www.bsjwtrust.co.uk/wp/wp-content/uploads/Fishing-By-Newlyn-Painters.pdf|publisher=Borlase Smart John Wells Trust|accessdate=23 May 2023|archivedate=23 May 2023}} It was painted the same year that Langely's wife, Clara, and the mother of his four children, died of a stroke.
References
{{reflist}}
- Roger Langley, Walter Langley: Pioneer of the Newlyn Art Colony, Sansom & Co., 1997.
= Further reading =
- {{cite book |last1=Langley |first1=Roger |title=Walter Langley, From Birmingham to Newlyn |date=2011 |publisher=Sansom & Co. |location=Bristol }}
External links
File:Walter Langley - Among The Missing 1884.jpg
{{Portal|Cornwall}}
- [http://www.bmagic.org.uk/people/Walter+Langley Biography] (Birmingham museums and art gallery)
- [http://www.penleehouse.org.uk/artists/walter-langley.html Works by Langley] (Penlee Gallery, Cornwall)
- [http://www.artcyclopedia.com/artists/langley_walter.html Walter Langley online] (Artcyclopedia)
- [http://myweb.tiscali.co.uk/speel/paint/langley.htm Short biography of Langley] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180723091321/http://myweb.tiscali.co.uk/speel/paint/langley.htm |date=23 July 2018 }} (Bob Speel's website)
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Category:19th-century English painters
Category:20th-century English painters
Category:Painters from Birmingham, West Midlands
Category:English male painters
Category:English watercolourists
Category:English landscape artists
Category:Members and Associates of the Royal Birmingham Society of Artists
Category:Newlyn School of Artists