Stanley Spencer was born on June 30, 1891 in Cookham, United Kingdom. He was a son of William Spencer, a music teacher and church organist, and Anna Caroline (Slack) Spencer. Stanley's brother, Gilbert Spencer, also became a renowned painter.
Initially, Stanley was educated at home, as his parents could not afford private education for him. However, he took drawing lessons from a local artist, Dorothy Bailey. In 1907, he briefly attended Maidenhead Technical Institute. Since 1908 to 1912, Spencer studied at Slade School of Fine Art in London, where Henry Tonks was one of his mentors.
In 1958, University of Southampton awarded him the Honorary Degree of Doctor of Letters.
In 1915, Spencer volunteered to serve with the Royal Army Medical Corps and worked as an orderly at the Beaufort War Hospital in Bristol (later Glenside Hospital). In 1916, he was sent to Macedonia to serve with the 68th Field Ambulance unit. The following year, Stanley was transferred to an infantry unit, the 7th Battalion of the Berkshire Regiment. After two and a half years on the front line in Macedonia, facing both German and Bulgarian troops, he was invalided out of the Army, following persistent bouts of malaria. His survival of the devastation and torment, that killed so many of his fellows, indelibly marked Spencer's attitude to life and death. Throughout his life, he depicted his experience in his religious works.
In 1919, the painter was commissioned by the British War Memorials Committee of the Ministry of Information to paint what became "Travoys Arriving with Wounded at a Dressing Station at Smol, Macedonia, September 1916" (now in the Imperial War Museum). It was visibly the consequence of Spencer's experience in the medical corps. A further major commission was to paint murals for the Sandham Memorial Chapel in Burghclere. The altarpiece depicts the Resurrection of the Soldiers.
Between 1924 and 1926, Stanley painted "The Resurrection" in a studio in Hampstead, borrowed from Henry Lamb. When the work was exhibited for the first time in February 1927, a critic of "The Times" newspaper described it as "the most important picture, painted by any English artist in the present century". The painting was purchased by Joseph Duveen, who then gave it to the Tate Gallery.
In 1939, at the suggestion of his friend William Rothenstein, he went on a painting holiday to Leonard Stanley, who lived in Gloucestershire. This holiday extended for two years. During that trip, Stanley created many works.
Spencer's work as a war artist in the Second World War included his epic depiction of shipbuilding workers and their families at Port Glasgow on the Clyde. When the war ended, he again took up, as did certain other British neo-romantic artists of the time, his visionary preoccupations — in Spencer's case with a sometimes apocalyptic tinge.
In September 1945, Spencer returned to Cookham, settling down in Cliveden View, a small house, belonging to his brother. There, he returned to the resurrection theme in a series of large-scale religious artworks. In the spring of 1954, the Chinese government invited various western delegations to visit China for the fifth anniversary celebrations of the "Liberation" of October 1949. Members of the hastily assembled "cultural delegation" included Stanley Spencer, Leonard Hawkes, Rex Warner, Hugh Casson and A. J. Ayer.
Towards the end of 1955, a large retrospective of Spencer's work was held at the Tate and he began a series of large paintings, centred on the work "Christ Preaching at Cookham Regatta", which he produced for the Church-House.
During his lifetime, Stanley took part in numerous exhibitions, including Venice Biennale in 1932 and 1938.
Stanley Spencer became famous for his paintings, depicting Biblical scenes, as well as his depictions of bucolic English countryside, his portraits of distinguished friends and patrons. "The Resurrection, Cookham" is one of his most notable works.
In 1950, Spencer was made a Royal Academician. The same year, he was also made a Commander of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire. In 1959, Stanley was appointed Knight of the same order.
Stanley's works were sold at high prices at auctions, including his work "Sunflower and Dog Worship", which was sold for £5.4m. Today, many of his works are kept in the collections of different galleries and museums, including the Tate Gallery in London, the Museum of Modern Art in New York, the Stanley Spencer Gallery in his hometown of Cookham, the National Gallery of Victoria in Melbourne and others.
Quotations:
"Everything has a sort of double meaning for me, there's the ordinary everyday meaning of things, and the imaginary meaning about it all, and I wanted to bring these things together, and in this first big Resurrection of mine you have a good example of this sort of thing."
"When I lived in Cookham I was disturbed by a feeling of everything being meaningless.But quite suddenly I became aware that everything was full of special meaning and this made everything holy...I observed this sacred quality in most unexpected quarters."
"I love to dwell on the thought that the artist is next in divinity to the saint. He, like the saint, performs miracles."
When Spencer was a student of Slade School of Fine Art, he allied with a short-lived group "Neo-Primitives". Also, in 1950, he was made a Royal Academician.
Stanley was often described as a "small man with twinkling eyes and shaggy grey hair, often wearing his pyjamas under his suit if it was cold". When he was a student of the Slade School of Fine Art, he got the nickname "Cookham", as his attachment to Cookham, his home town, was so profound, that most days he took the train back home in time for tea ceremony.
In 1925, Stanley married Hilda Carline, a painter. Their marriage produced two daughters — Shirin and Unity. In 1937, the couple divorced. Four days after his divorce, Spencer married artist Patricia Preece, who was a lesbian. But their marriage didn't last long and the couple divorced one year later. In the 1940's, Stanley lived with a couple, George and Daphne Charlton, both artists.
