Arthur William Symons
1 portrait
© DACS; Tate 2021; on loan to the National Portrait Gallery, London
Arthur William Symons
by Jacques-Emile Blanche
oil on canvas, 1895
31 7/8 in. x 25 5/8 in. (810 mm x 651 mm)
Lent by Tate Gallery, 1967
Primary Collection
NPG L135
Sitterback to top
- Arthur William Symons (1865-1945), Poet, translator, critic and editor. Sitter in 7 portraits.
Artistback to top
- Jacques-Emile Blanche (1861-1942), Painter and writer. Artist or producer associated with 8 portraits, Sitter in 3 portraits.
This portraitback to top
Blanche's portrait of Symons was painted in Dieppe in the summer of 1895. Dieppe was a popular resort for English artists and writers and Blanche himself a focus for Anglo-French artistic relations.
Events of 1895back to top
Current affairs
Oscar Wilde's The Importance of Being Earnest is first performed, the same year that he is imprisoned for homosexual offences following accusations made against him by the eighth Marquess of Queensbury. Whilst in prison, Wilde wrote De Profundis, a letter addressed to his former lover, Queensbury's son Lord Alfred Douglas, attacking him for his role in Wilde's imprisonment.Prime Minister Lord Rosebery resigns and is succeeded by Salisbury.
Art and science
The Lumiere brothers hold the first public screening of movies at Paris's Salon Indien du Grand Café, featuring ten short films recorded with Leon Bouly's cinematographe device, recognised as the birth of cinema as a commercial medium.Henry Irving, the celebrated actor and theatre manager, becomes the first actor to receive a knighthood.
International
In South Africa, prompted by the growing unrest of unfranchised British immigrants (Uitlanders) drawn to the Transvaal by the discovery of gold, Rhodes and other members of the South African mining community begin to plot the republic's overthrow. As a result, the disastrous Jameson Raid takes place, carried out on Paul Kruger's Transvaal Republic by Leander Starr Jameson and his Rhodesian and Bechuanaland policemen: it fails to bring about an Uitlander uprising.Comments back to top
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