Walter John Bayes (31 May 1869 – 21 January 1956) was an English painter and illustrator who was a founder member of both the
Camden Town Group and the
London Group
The London Group is a society based in London, England, created to offer additional exhibiting opportunities to artists besides the Royal Academy of Arts. Formed in 1913, it is one of the oldest artist-led organisations in the world. It was form ...
and also a renowned art teacher and critic.
Biography
Early life
Bayes was born in
St Pancras, London
St Pancras () is a district in North London. It was originally a medieval Civil parish#Ancient parishes, ancient parish and subsequently became a metropolitan borough. The metropolitan borough then merged with neighbouring boroughs and the are ...
, the second of four children to Alfred Walter Bayes, a painter and etcher who exhibited regularly at the
Royal Academy
The Royal Academy of Arts (RA) is an art institution based in Burlington House in Piccadilly London, England. Founded in 1768, it has a unique position as an independent, privately funded institution led by eminent artists and architects. Its ...
, and Emily Ann Fielden. Walter's sister,
Jessie, was a designer in the Arts and Crafts style and his younger brother was the sculptor
Gilbert Bayes
Gilbert William Bayes (4 April 1872 – 10 July 1953) was an English sculptor. His art works varied in scale from medals to large architectural clocks, monuments and equestrian statues and he was also a designer of some note, creating chess piec ...
.
Walter Bayes attended the Quaker School at Saffron Waldon. While there, he and
E.V. Lucas and Graham Hill started a periodical broadsheet.
[E.V. Lucas “The old contemporaries” (1935) Methuen, p.147.]
He then attended
University College School
University College School, also known as UCS, is a private day school in Frognal, Hampstead, London, England. The school was founded in 1830 by University College London and inherited many of that institution's progressive and secular views.
...
before beginning work in a solicitor's office. He did not enjoy the work and in 1886 began to take evening classes at the City and Guilds of London Institute in Finsbury before studying full-time at the
Westminster School of Art.
In 1894 he spent a short period of time studying at the
Academie Julian in Paris.
Career
By the turn of the century Bayes had already exhibited a landscape painting at the Royal Academy, in 1890, and had exhibited at the
New English Art Club
The New English Art Club (NEAC) is a society for contemporary artists that was founded in London, England, in 1886 as an alternative venue to the Royal Academy. The NEAC holds an annual exhibition of paintings and drawings at the Mall Galleries ...
in 1892.
Later during the 1890s Bayes began teaching, first at the City and Guilds of London Institute, later at Bolt Court School of Art and then at the
Camberwell School of Arts and Crafts. He also started writing on art theory and criticism with regular columns in ''Outlook'', ''Saturday Review'' and ''Weekend Review''. He continued to paint, mostly landscapes in oil and watercolour but also developed an interest in theatre design. The first work by Bayes purchased by a major British gallery was ''Top o' the Tide'' which the
Walker Art Gallery
The Walker Art Gallery is an art gallery in Liverpool, which houses one of the largest art collections in England outside London. It is part of the National Museums Liverpool group.
History
The Walker Art Gallery's collection dates from 1819 ...
acquired in 1900.
In 1901 he had painted scenes for a production
Henrik Ibsen
Henrik Johan Ibsen (; ; 20 March 1828 – 23 May 1906) was a Norwegian playwright, poet and actor. Ibsen is considered the world's pre-eminent dramatist of the 19th century and is often referred to as "the father of modern drama." He pioneered ...
's ''John Gabriel Borkman'' and in 1911 would exhibit both costume and scenery designs.
In 1906 Bayes became the art critic of ''Athenaeum'' in place of
Roger Fry
Roger Eliot Fry (14 December 1866 – 9 September 1934) was an English painter and art critic, critic, and a member of the Bloomsbury Group. Establishing his reputation as a scholar of the Old Masters, he became an advocate of more recent ...
.
In 1908 Bayes was one of the initial eighty artists to join the
Allied Artists' Association formed by
Frank Rutter
Francis Vane Phipson Rutter (17 February 1876 – 18 April 1937)"Rutter, Frank V. P.", ''Who Was Who'', A & C Black, 1920–2007; online edn, Oxford University Press, Dec 2007. Retrieved froukwhoswho8 August 2008. was a British art art critic, c ...
. At the first Allied Artist's Association exhibition Bayes met
Walter Sickert, who invited him to attend the regular weekly meetings of the
Fitzroy Street Group. When the
Camden Town Group was formed in 1911, Bayes was ideally placed to become one of its founding members, as they also met frequently at Sickert's studio.
Bayes exhibited work at all three Camden Town Group exhibitions and, in 1913, became a founding member of the
London Group
The London Group is a society based in London, England, created to offer additional exhibiting opportunities to artists besides the Royal Academy of Arts. Formed in 1913, it is one of the oldest artist-led organisations in the world. It was form ...
.
[ He also exhibited at the Franco-British Exhibition of 1908.] In the 1910s, a constant theme of Bayes's work were direct oil sketches of his wife and his sons.
World War I
During World War I, Bayes continued to teach at the Camberwell School of Arts and Crafts, which was close to the Elephant & Castle tube station
Elephant & Castle is a London Underground station in the London Borough of Southwark in Central London. It is on the Bank and Monument stations, Bank branch of the Northern line, between Borough tube station, Borough and Kennington tube stati ...
on the London Underground. This was to be the site of one of Bayes's best known works, ''The Underworld: Taking cover in a Tube Station during a London air raid''. The scale and composition reflects Bayes's pre-war work as a theatre designer and creates the impression that the viewer is passing through the station, and past the cast of characters on the platform, as if on a train. The picture was shown at the 1918 Royal Academy show and purchased by the Imperial War Museum
The Imperial War Museum (IWM), currently branded "Imperial War Museums", is a British national museum. It is headquartered in London, with five branches in England. Founded as the Imperial War Museum in 1917, it was intended to record the civ ...
, who asked Bayes if he would do a further work for the Ministry of Information. Bayes spent some time in Devon in 1918 preparing for what became ''Landing Survivors from a Torpedoed Ship''. This painting was earmarked by the British War Memorials Committee for a proposed, but never built, national Hall of Remembrance. When that project was cancelled the painting was given to the Imperial War Museum but was destroyed by fire in 1977.
Later career
In 1918 Bayes was appointed Principal of the Westminster School of Art, a post he was to hold until 1934. From 1927 to 1939 Bayes was a lecturer in Perspective at the Royal Academy Schools
The Royal Academy of Arts (RA) is an art institution based in Burlington House in Piccadilly London, England. Founded in 1768, it has a unique position as an independent, privately funded institution led by eminent artists and architects. Its ...
and when he left Westminster in 1934 he continued teaching as a visiting lecturer at Reading University
The University of Reading is a public research university in Reading, Berkshire, England. It was founded in 1892 as the University Extension College, Reading, an extension college of Christchurch College, Oxford, and became University College, ...
until 1937.[ Early in ]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 ...
Bayes submitted works to the War Artists' Advisory Committee for purchase but was refused. In May 1942, however WAAC offered Bayes a short commission to produce a large oil painting on the subject of the air raids that had resulted in damage to parts of Buckingham Palace in 1940 and 1941. The resulting painting, ''Battle of Britain: Parachutists from an enemy aircraft brought down in an apparent attempt to bomb Buckingham Palace'', led to further war-time commissions. During the war Bayes was a prolific contributor to the Recording Britain scheme, producing numerous views of interior locations that often focused on leisure activities and people eating and drinking. He produced 29 watercolours of London for the project, 23 of Essex and 20 of other areas, including seven drawings of Oxford. In 1944 Bayes became Director of Painting at Lancaster School of Arts and Crafts, finally retiring in 1949, aged eighty.[
]
Published works
* 1927: ''The Art of Decorative Painting'',
* 1931: ''Turner: a Speculative Portrait''
* 1932: ''A Painter's Baggage''
References
External links
*
{{DEFAULTSORT:Bayes, Walter
1869 births
1956 deaths
19th-century English male artists
19th-century English painters
20th-century English male artists
20th-century English painters
Académie Julian alumni
Alumni of the Westminster School of Art
English war artists
English art critics
English illustrators
English male painters
Painters from London
People from St Pancras, London
Sibling artists
World War I artists
20th-century British war artists
World War II artists
People educated at University College School