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The St John's Wood Arts Club, 1895

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The St John's Wood Arts Club, 1895

by Sydney Prior Hall
black crayon, white and grey paint on paper, circa 1895
15 1/4 in. x 11 1/4 in. (387 mm x 285 mm)
Given by Colonel A.C.B. Clayton on behalf of the St John's Wood Arts Club, 1964
Primary Collection
NPG 4404

Artistback to top

  • Sydney Prior Hall (1842-1922), Portrait painter and illustrator. Artist associated with 152 portraits, Sitter in 2 portraits.

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The St John's Wood Arts Club was founded as a social meeting place for artists living and working in the area in London. The painter Arthur Hacker is shown here at its inaugural dinner, tracing Alma-Tadema's silhouette for a frieze at the Club made up of its members' shadow portraits. Alma-Tadema moved to Grove End Road in St John's Wood in 1886, extensively remodelled his home to his own designs, and created another social hub with his Tuesday evening dinners and concerts. This image was published as an engraving in the Graphic, 23 February 1895

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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.

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