Mark Gertler, born Marks Gertler, was one of the leading British painters of the 1920s.
Background
Although born in London, his early childhood was spent in Poland, where his father left the family while seeking a livelihood in the United States. His mother worked in a Jewish restaurant, feeding her five children on the daily leftovers. After five years, the family was reunited in England, where they lived at first in one room, all seven of them sleeping on the floor. Tuberculosis was rampant in White chapel, where they lived, and Mark’s health was affected. There, he also had the first attack of a serious depression that was to plague him all his life.
Education
From 1907 he studied art in the evenings and worked in a stained glass factory until the Jewish Educational Aid Society paid for his studies at the Slade School of Art, where he won many scholarships and prizes.
Career
Gertler was elected a member of the New England Art Club, and in 1914 was included in the Whitechapel Gallery’s exhibition, “Twentieth Century Art.” He made many friends among artists and writers, among them D. H. Lawrence, Lytton Strachey, and Gilbert Cannan, whose book, Mendel, published in 1916, was based on Gertler’s life.
During this period he was confined to tuberculosis sanatoriums on several occasions, and his bouts of severe depression became more frequent. He fell in love and lived with Dora Carrington, who subsequently left him and went to live with Strachey as his housekeeper. Meeting them in the street, Gertler attacked Strachey in a fit of jealous fury.
In the 1930s, he suffered a number of setbacks, including unsuccessful exhibitions. In 1936, during a three-month stay at a sanatorium he made an unsuccessful suicide attempt, but eventually in 1939, killed himself,
Personality
Gertler developed a robust style that was influenced by the French Post-Impressionists, particularly Derain. He painted many landscapes, still lifes, and voluptuous and sensual nudes, by the British public attributed to of his Polish-Jewish background. His goal was to paint “the beauty that trembles on the edge of ugliness...” to paint a picture “in which I hope to express all the sorrow of Life....”