Gertrude des Clayes

Gertrude des Clayes
1929 self portrait
Born1879
Aberdeen, Scotland
Died23 August 1949(1949-08-23) (aged 69–70)
London, England
NationalityCanadian
Occupationpainter

Gertrude des Clayes RCA (1879 – 23 August 1949) was a Scottish-born artist who lived in England and Quebec, Canada. Des Clayes was best known as a portrait painter.[1][2]

Life

She was born in Aberdeen and studied at the Bushey School of Art and at the Académie Julian in Paris with Tony Robert-Fleury and Jules Lefebvre. She lived in London from 1906 to 1912 and received a medal from the French Salon in 1909. In 1911, she became a member of the National Portrait Society (founded in 1910[3]). Des Clayes moved to Montreal in 1912. In 1914, she was elected an associate of the Royal Canadian Academy of Arts.[4] One of her portraits appeared in The Fine Arts in Canada (1925) by Newton MacTavish. She returned to England in 1936.[2]

Children gathering Bluebells

Des Clayes created a portrait of railway entrepreneur Sir William Mackenzie's mother, Mary, using photographs taken of Mary's sisters and by studying Mary's daughters and granddaughters; no photographs were available of Mary Mackenzie herself who had died 27 years before des Clayes was born.[5]

Des Clayes died in London in 1949.[2]

Her sisters Berthe (1877-1967) and Alice (1890-1968) were also artists.[6]

Her work is included in the collections of the Musée national des beaux-arts du Québec,[7] National Gallery of Canada and the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts.[2]

References

  1. ^ "Gertrude Des Clayes". National Gallery of Canada.
  2. ^ a b c d "Des Clayes, Gertrude". Canadian Women Artists History Initiative.
  3. ^ "Sir Gerald Kelly". National Portrait Gallery.
  4. ^ McMann, Evelyn (1981). Royal Canadian Academy of Arts. Toronto: University of Toronto Press. Retrieved 21 November 2022.
  5. ^ Fleming, R B (2007). The Railway King of Canada: Sir William Mackenzie, 1849-1923. UBC Press. p. 182. ISBN 978-0774850780.
  6. ^ "Berthe Des Clayes". Hambleton Galleries. Archived from the original on 4 March 2016. Retrieved 22 February 2016.
  7. ^ "Gertrude Des Clayes". www.collections.mnbaq.org. Retrieved 18 January 2020.