Background

John Maler Collier was born on January 27, 1850 in London, United Kingdom. He was a son of Robert Collier, 1st Baron Monkswell, who was a judge and amateur artist. John's grandfather was a Quaker merchant.

Education

John studied at Eton College and Slade School of Fine Art. Also, in 1875, he attended Academy of Fine Arts in Munich. During his time in Paris, Collier studied art under Jean-Paul Laurens.

Career

John Collier developed a highly successful career, creating society portraits. He exhibited 83 times at the famous Royal Academy in London. Also, his works were shown more than one hundred times at other prestigious galleries, including Suffolk Street Gallery, the Royal Hibernian Academy, the Society of French Artists and others.

His commissioned portrait of King George V as Master of Trinity House in 1901 shows the extent of his fashionable reputation. John's other subjects included two Lord Chancellors (the Earl of Selborne in 1882 and the Earl of Halsbury in 1898), Rudyard Kipling (1891), the painter Sir Lawrence Alma-Tadema (1884), Charles Darwin (1882), Dr. Joule F.R.S. (1882) and the artist’s father-in-law Professor Huxley (1891).

During his lifetime, Collier published several treatises on paintings. His writings showed a strict, accurate and practical approach, diligence and attention to detail, that was rated above artistic flair. Despite the fact, that John suffered from paralysis for many of his last years, he continued to work until his death.

Achievements

• John Maler Collier was known as one of the most prominent portrait painters of his generation. "Clytemnestra", "Horace and Lydia", "In the Forest of Arden" and "Lady Godiva" are among his well-known works. Today, his works are kept in the collections of the National Portrait Gallery in London and the Tate Gallery.
  
  In 1891, he co-founded Royal Society of Portrait Painters in London. Also, in 1920, the artist was awarded the Order of the British Empire.

Works

More photos

• painting

  • Eve

  • Pharaoh's Handmaidens

  • The Artist's Wife, Marion Collier (née Huxley)

  • Thomas Henry Huxley

  • Rudyard Kipling

  • Charles Robert Darwin

  • The Child Bride

  • Mrs Huxley

  • Priestess of Delphi

  • In the Forest of Arden

  • Lilith with a Snake

  • A glass of wine with Caesar Borgia

  • The Death of Cleopatra

  • Spring at Cadenabbia

  • Lady Godiva

  • Sleeping Beauty

  • The Laboratory

  • Queen Guinevre's Maying

  • The Priestess of Bacchus

  • The Last Voyage of Henry Hudson

  • The Spring Wood

  • Spring

  • The Prodigal Daughter

  • Horace and Lydia

  • The Land Baby

  • Sir George Biddell Airy

  • The Grand Lady

  • Clytemnestra

  • The Garden Party

  • Angela McInnes

  • Portrait of Professor Huxley

  • Tannhäuser in the Venusberg

  • The Sinner

  • The Water Nymph

Religion

John once said, that the triumph of Roman Catholicism, would mean an unspeakable disaster to the cause of civilization.

Views

Collier was looking forward to a time, when ethics would have taken the place of religion. He thought, that the benefits of religion could be attained by other means, which would be less conducive to strife and which put less strain on upon the reasoning faculties. His views on ethics, were very close to the agnosticism of T.H. Huxley and the humanism of Julian Huxley.

Quotations: "People may claim without much exaggeration that the belief in God is universal. They omit to add that superstition, often of the most degraded kind, is just as universal."

Membership

John was a member of the Royal Institute of Oil Painters.

• founding member

  Royal Society of Portrait Painters , United Kingdom

  1891

Interests

• Lawn-tennis, cycling

Connections

Collier married Marian (Mady) Huxley, a painter, in 1879. When their daughter Joyce was born, Marian suffered from post-natal depression, and some time later, after treatment in Paris, she fell ill with pneumonia and died in 1887. Two years later, in 1889, Collier married Marian's sister, whose name was Ethel Huxley. The ceremony took place in Norway, because such a marriage was not allowed in England at that time. Ethel and John gave birth to two children — Laurence and Joan.

Father:

Robert Collier

child:

Joyce Collier

child:

Laurence Collier

child:

Joan Collier

Grandfather:

John Collier

First wife:

Marian (Mady) Huxley

Second wife:

Ethel Huxley

mentor:

Jean-Paul Laurens

References

• 34 Color Paintings of John Collier — British Romantic Portrait Painter (January 27, 1850 - April 11, 1934)
  2013
• The art of the Hon. John Collier
  1914