Later Victorian Portraits Catalogue
Philip Hermogenes Calderon (1833-1898), Historical and genre painter
- Gallery portraits
- All known portraits
- Biography and References
Painter; born 3 May 1833, at Poitiers, France, son of a French mother and Spanish father who settled in London 1845. Trained at Leigh’s Art School and Atelier Picot in Paris; exhibition debut at the Royal Academy 1853, followed by long and prosperous career producing historical genre scenes and fancy pictures; from 1862 a leading member of the Clique of like-minded artists from St John’s Wood; elected ARA 1864, RA 1867; later also a member of the Legion d’honneur; best-known works include Broken Vows and St Elizabeth of Hungary (both Tate) and Her Most High, Noble and Puissant Grace (Leeds AG); major patrons included Sir John Aird, George Holt and G.C. Schwabe; from 1887 Keeper of the RA, where he died 30 April 1898.
Calderon was very tall, with long limbs and a beaky nose; he was said to look like ‘a Spanish gentleman translated into English’. Temperamentally he had ‘a personality that persuaded and even commanded’ but was also ‘very witty [with] an uncompromising spirit and withal most fascinating manner’ who ‘could be severe and unflinching and yet as tender as a child’. [1]
Dr Jan Marsh
Calderon was very tall, with long limbs and a beaky nose; he was said to look like ‘a Spanish gentleman translated into English’. Temperamentally he had ‘a personality that persuaded and even commanded’ but was also ‘very witty [with] an uncompromising spirit and withal most fascinating manner’ who ‘could be severe and unflinching and yet as tender as a child’. [1]
Dr Jan Marsh
Referencesback to top
Bills & Knight 2006Bills, M., and V. Knight, eds, William Powell Frith: Painting the Victorian Age, London, 2006.
Cast 2004
Cast., D., ‘Calderon, Philip Hermogenes (1833–1898)’, ODNB, Oxford, 2004.
Cooper 1876–83
Cooper, T., Men of Mark: A Gallery of Contemporary Portraits of Men Distinguished in the Senate, the Church, in Science, Literature and Art, the Army, Navy, Law, Medicine, etc. Photographed from life by Lock and Whitfield, London, 7 ser., 1876–83.
Du Maurier 1951
Du Maurier, D., ed., The Young George Du Maurier: A Selection of his Letters 1860–67, London, 1951.
Furniss 1890b
Furniss, H., Royal Academy Antics, London, 1890.
Gaunt 1972
Gaunt, W., The Restless Century: Painting in Britain 1800–1900, London, 1972.
Gould 2004
Gould, V.F., G.F. Watts: The Last Great Victorian, London, 2004.
Hacking 2000
Hacking, J., Princes of Victorian Bohemia: Photographs by David Wilkie Wynfield, exh. cat., NPG, London, 2000.
Herkomer 1910–11
Herkomer, H. von, The Herkomers, 2 vols, London, 1910–11.
Hillier 1964
Hillier, B., ‘The St John’s Wood Clique’, Apollo, vol.79, June 1964, pp.490–95.
Jones et al. 1996
Jones, S., and others, Frederic Leighton 1830–1896, exh. cat., Royal Academy, London, 1996.
Maas 1984
Maas, J., The Victorian Art World in Photographs, London, 1984.
McMaster 2008
McMaster, J., ‘That Mighty Art of Black-and-White: Linley Sambourne, Punch and the Royal Academy’, British Art Journal, Autumn 2008, pp.62–76.
McMaster 2009
McMaster, J., That Mighty Art of Black-and-White: Linley Sambourne, Punch and the Royal Academy, Edmonton, Canada, 2009.
Marks 1894
Marks, H.S., Pen & Pencil Sketches, 2 vols, London, 1894.
Morris & Milner 1992
Morris, E., and F. Milner, ‘And When Did You Last See Your Father?’, exh. cat., Walker Art Gallery, Liverpool, 1992.
Noakes 1978
Noakes, A., William Frith: Extraordinary Victorian Painter, London, 1978.
Ormond 1969
Ormond, L., George Du Maurier, London, 1969.
Ormond 2010
Ormond, L., Linley Sambourne: Illustrator and Punch Cartoonist, London, 2010.
Ormond & Ormond 1975
Ormond, L., and R. Ormond, Lord Leighton, London, 1975.
Robinson [1892]
Robinson, R.W., Members and Associates of the Royal Academy of Arts, 1891. Photographed in their Studios by Ralph W. Robinson of Redhill, n.p., [1892].
Smith 1927
Smith, M.H.S Art and Anecdote: Recollections of William Frederick Yeames R.A, His Life and His Friends, London, 1927.
Snow 1975
Snow, C.P., Trollope, London, 1975.
Storey 1898
Storey, G.A., ‘Philip Hermogenes Calderon, RA’, Magazine of Art, 1898, p.446–52.
Swanson 1977
Swanson, V.G., Sir Lawrence Alma-Tadema: Painter of the Victorian Vision of the Ancient World, London, 1977.
Walkley 1994
Walkley, G., Artists’ Houses in London 1764–1914, Aldershot, 1994.
Wood 1976
Wood, C., Victorian Panorama: Paintings of Victorian Life, London, 1976.
[Wood] 1984
[Wood, C., intro.,] A Fraternity of Artists: A Set of Sixty-two Portraits of Late Victorian Artists, by Walker Hodgson, exh. leaflet, Christopher Wood Gallery, London, 1984.
Wood 2006
Wood, C., William Powell Frith: A Painter & His World, Stroud, Glos., 2006.
Dr Jan Marsh