Professor Arthur Pan (18 December 1894 – 1983) was a Hungarian artist and portrait painter, whose subjects included

Winston Churchill Sir Winston Leonard Spencer Churchill (30 November 1874 – 24 January 1965) was a British statesman, military officer, and writer who was Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1940 to 1945 (Winston Churchill in the Second World War, ...

. __TOC__

Life and work

Arthur Pan was born in

Timișoara Timișoara (, , ; , also or ; ; ; see #Etymology, other names) is the capital city of Timiș County, Banat, and the main economic, social and cultural center in Western Romania. Located on the Bega (Tisza), Bega River, Timișoara is consider ...

Austria-Hungary Austria-Hungary, also referred to as the Austro-Hungarian Empire, the Dual Monarchy or the Habsburg Monarchy, was a multi-national constitutional monarchy in Central Europe#Before World War I, Central Europe between 1867 and 1918. A military ...

, and studied at the

Budapest Budapest is the Capital city, capital and List of cities and towns of Hungary, most populous city of Hungary. It is the List of cities in the European Union by population within city limits, tenth-largest city in the European Union by popul ...

Academy of Art and in

Paris Paris () is the Capital city, capital and List of communes in France with over 20,000 inhabitants, largest city of France. With an estimated population of 2,048,472 residents in January 2025 in an area of more than , Paris is the List of ci ...

at the

Académie Julian The () was a private art school for painting and sculpture founded in Paris, France, in 1867 by French painter and teacher Rodolphe Julian (1839–1907). The school was active from 1868 through 1968. It remained famous for the number and qual ...

."Artist's biography: Pan, Arthur"
, artinaclick.com. Retrieved 20 September 2009. He came to England as a refugee from the

Nazi Nazism (), formally named National Socialism (NS; , ), is the far-right politics, far-right Totalitarianism, totalitarian socio-political ideology and practices associated with Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party (NSDAP) in Germany. During H ...

s.''Paper maker and British paper trade journal'', Volumes 111-112, p.78. Retrieved fro
Google Books
19 September 2009. He painted in

England England is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. It is located on the island of Great Britain, of which it covers about 62%, and List of islands of England, more than 100 smaller adjacent islands. It ...

1920 - 1960 as a

portraitist A portrait is a painting, photograph, sculpture, or other artistic representation of a person, in which the face is always predominant. In arts, a portrait may be represented as half body and even full body. If the subject in full body better re ...

working primarily in oil. He painted portraits of historical personages, including Sir

. On 25 December 1943, ''The Illustrated London News'' carried a double page spread of "Mr Churchill—A Characteristic Portrait of the Prime Minister from a Painting By Professor Arthur Pan". A replica of a large Churchill portrait by Pan was bought for the

White House The White House is the official residence and workplace of the president of the United States. Located at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue Northwest (Washington, D.C.), NW in Washington, D.C., it has served as the residence of every U.S. president ...

. Pan also painted a "striking" portrait of South African Field Marshal

Jan Smuts Field Marshal Jan Christian Smuts, (baptismal name Jan Christiaan Smuts, 24 May 1870 11 September 1950) was a South African statesman, military leader and philosopher. In addition to holding various military and cabinet posts, he served as P ...

for

Christ's College, Cambridge Christ's College is a Colleges of the University of Cambridge, constituent college of the University of Cambridge, England. The college includes the Master, the Fellows of the College, and about 450 undergraduate and 250 graduate students. The c ...

and Lord Catto, On 7 April 1945, ''The Illustrated London News'' carried a full front page of a specially commissioned painting by Pan of Lieut. General Sir

Miles Dempsey General Sir Miles Christopher Dempsey, (15 December 1896 – 5 June 1969) was a senior British Army officer who served in both world wars. During the Second World War he commanded the Second Army in northwest Europe. A highly professional car ...

DSO MC, The Commander of the British Second Army and the first British Army commander to cross the River Rhine. In its issue of 4 March 1959, ''The Motor'' magazine referred to Pan's portrait of the late Sir George Beharrell and mistakenly also described the artist as dead, for which it apologised in a subsequent issue. Two portraits were commissioned by the artist's physician, Dr. Ernst Friedrich Blumberg. The paintings were of the physician's wife Marion Harding in 1962, which she has in her collection, and an earlier work of his father Dr. Jacob Moritz Blumberg, a

surgeon In medicine, a surgeon is a medical doctor who performs surgery. Even though there are different traditions in different times and places, a modern surgeon is a licensed physician and received the same medical training as physicians before spec ...

and

gynaecologist Gynaecology or gynecology (see American and British English spelling differences) is the area of medicine concerned with conditions affecting the female reproductive system. It is often paired with the field of obstetrics, which focuses on pre ...

; the whereabouts of the latter is unknown. "Marion Harding"
marionharding.net. Retrieved 19 September 2009. They were painted at the residence of the artist in Chorley Wood,

Hertfordshire Hertfordshire ( or ; often abbreviated Herts) is a ceremonial county in the East of England and one of the home counties. It borders Bedfordshire to the north-west, Cambridgeshire to the north-east, Essex to the east, Greater London to the ...

, England. During the 1950s Pan lived for two years at the

Baghdad Baghdad ( or ; , ) is the capital and List of largest cities of Iraq, largest city of Iraq, located along the Tigris in the central part of the country. With a population exceeding 7 million, it ranks among the List of largest cities in the A ...

Palace of King

Faisal II of Iraq Faisal II (; 2 May 1935 – 14 July 1958) was the last King of Iraq. He reigned from 4 April 1939 until July 1958, when he was killed during the 14 July Revolution. This regicide marked the end of the thirty-seven-year-old Hashemite monarchy in ...

where he worked on a commission for the Iraqi Royal Family. The portraits were all destroyed in the coup d'état of July, 1958. A head and shoulders portrait of Churchill by Pan was auctioned at Christie's Fine Art Auction House in 1981. Another portrait of Churchill by Pan, completed in 1943 during

World War II World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...

, hangs in the American Embassy in London, England. Pan made two copies of paintings by

Willem van de Velde the Younger Willem van de Velde the Younger (18 December 1633 (baptised)6 April 1707) was a Dutch marine painter, the son of Willem van de Velde the Elder, who also specialised in maritime art. His brother, Adriaen van de Velde, was a landscape painter. ...

, ''The Shore at Sheveningen'' and ''Dutch Vessels Close Inshore at Low Tide'', 13.5 x 18.5", both of which he signed."Lot 608: After Willem Van de Velde the Younger"
invaluable.com. Retrieved 19 September 2009. They came up for auction in the UK in 2001. Pan had a son who became an architect.

Notes

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Pan, Arthur Hungarian portrait painters 1894 births 1983 deaths 20th-century Hungarian painters Hungarian male painters 20th-century Hungarian male artists Hungarian emigrants to the United Kingdom

Life and work

See also

Notes

References