Wilfrid de Glehn 1870-1951
Works
Biography
The English Hospital at Arc en Barrios, 1916
Wilfred de Glehn was thoroughly cosmopolitan in his upbringing and outlook. He was born Wilfred Gabriel von Glehn in Sydenham, South London, and was educated at Brighton College. His father, Alexander von Glehn, was involved in the building of narrow-gauge railways in France, as well as being a coffee-merchant. Wilfred left Brighton College in 1889, spent a very brief period at the Royal Academy Schools, South Kensington, and had enrolled at the Ecole Nationale des Beaux-Arts in Paris by 1891.
Wilfred first met John Singer Sargent when he was still a student at the Ecole des Beaux-Arts in Paris. The American painter Edwin Austin Abbey hired Wilfred as his assistant on the ambitious mural decorations that he and Sargent had been commissioned to produce for the Boston Public Library. This working relationship developed into a firm friendship that lasted far beyond the period of the commission. Wilfrid and Sargent shared a fundamental cosmopolitan outlook.
In April of 1941 the de Glehns' home and studios of nearly forty years at Cheyne Walk were completely destroyed by a parachute bomb, which hit the neighboring Old Church in Chelsea. Having spent many of the months since the war had been declared with Wilfred's brother in Grantchester, near Cambridge, any plans to return home to London were now impossible. With so many of their old friends gone from the area too, including Sargent, there seemed little point in renting elsewhere in Chelsea. In March of 1942 the de Glehns moved permanently to their new home in Stratford Tony, not far from the house they had been renting at Wilton in Wiltshire.
Wilfred first met John Singer Sargent when he was still a student at the Ecole des Beaux-Arts in Paris. The American painter Edwin Austin Abbey hired Wilfred as his assistant on the ambitious mural decorations that he and Sargent had been commissioned to produce for the Boston Public Library. This working relationship developed into a firm friendship that lasted far beyond the period of the commission. Wilfrid and Sargent shared a fundamental cosmopolitan outlook.
In April of 1941 the de Glehns' home and studios of nearly forty years at Cheyne Walk were completely destroyed by a parachute bomb, which hit the neighboring Old Church in Chelsea. Having spent many of the months since the war had been declared with Wilfred's brother in Grantchester, near Cambridge, any plans to return home to London were now impossible. With so many of their old friends gone from the area too, including Sargent, there seemed little point in renting elsewhere in Chelsea. In March of 1942 the de Glehns moved permanently to their new home in Stratford Tony, not far from the house they had been renting at Wilton in Wiltshire.
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