Glyn Philpot
1884-1937
Philpot began as a portrait painter, confining his palette to the buffs and blacks of the Spanish masters, but gradually more colour crept into his work until his later pictures tended towards decorative abstraction. He studied at Lambeth School of Art from 1900 and at Académie Julian, Paris, under Laurens, in 1905, and was at first greatly influenced by Charles Ricketts. He exhibited at the RA from 1904 and had his first one-man show in 1910 at the Baillie Gallery. Philpot was elected an ARA in 1915 and a full RA in 1923 and became a member of the IS in 1913 and foundation member of the NPS in 1911. In 1913 he won the gold medal at the Carnegie Institute, Pittsburgh, and the following year joined the army. In 1918 he painted four portraits of admirals for the Imperial War Museum. He worked occasionally in Spain and France and travelled in Italy. He painted a mural in St. Stephen's Hall, Westminster, in 1927. In the early 1930s he lightened his and sharpened his style, influenced by fashionable French painting. A Young Breton was purchased by the Chantrey Bequest in 1917 and Mrs Gerard Simpson in 1937. His work is represented in many public collections worldwide and in 1985 the National Portrait Gallery published a catalogue about his work compiled by Robin Gibson.
