Keith Henderson (artist)

For the American football player, see Keith Henderson.
Keith Henderson
OBE RP RSW RWS ROI

Against a sand-coloured sky and foreground, two sections of damaged red brick walls frame a mass of rubble and fallen blue girders

A Wrecked Railway Bridge near the Hindenburg Line near Villers Guislain (1917) (Art IWM Art 246)
Born 17 April 1883
Scotland
Died 24 February 1982(1982-02-24) (aged 98)
South Africa
Nationality Scottish
Alma mater
Known for painting

Keith Henderson OBE RP RSW RWS ROI (17 April 1883 – 24 February 1982) was a Scottish painter who worked in both oils and watercolours, and who is known for his book illustrations and his poster work for London Transport and the Empire Marketing Board.[1] He had a long professional career that included periods as a war artist in both the First World War, in which he served in the trenches, and in the Second World War.[2]

Early life and First World War

Henderson was born in Scotland and brought up in Aberdeenshire and in London, where his father worked as a lawyer. He attended Orme Square School in London and Marlborough College. Henderson studied at the Slade School of Art before continuing to develop his art at the Académie de la Grande Chaumière in Paris.[3] While in Paris he shared a studio with Maxwell Armfield.[4] During the First World War he served on the Western Front. He depicted his experiences of warfare there in several paintings and in a book, Letters to Helen: Impressions of an Artist on the Western Front, first published in 1917.[5][6]

Between the two world wars Henderson travelled extensively in Africa and South America and would later include images of the flora and fauna he saw on these trips in his book illustrations.[7] Henderson worked as an illustrator, designing posters and book jackets. He illustrated books by W. H. Hudson and Eric Rücker Eddison, including The Worm Ouroboros, and, with Norman Wilkinson, an edition of Geoffrey Chaucer's translation of The Romaunt of the Rose.[8] He produced poster designs for both London Transport and the Empire Marketing Board, who sent him to paint in Cyprus for over a year.[3]

He also exhibited his work, at the Royal Academy[9] and a solo show of paintings of Cyprus at the Beaux Arts Gallery at Bruton Place in London.[10]

In August 1927, Henderson wrote a letter to The Times, giving his address as "Eoligarry, Isle of Barra, Outer Hebrides".[11] He also lived at Glen Nevis and, from 1942, for several years at Spean Bridge.[12] Henderson also worked in South Africa, Cyprus and Egypt.[13]

Second World War

In an almost monochromatic composition, a World War Two twin-engined bomber is seen silhouetted against its open hangar door
An Improvised Test of an Under-carriage by Keith Henderson

At the start of the Second World War, Henderson was one of the first two artists, alongside Paul Nash, appointed as a full-time salaried artist to the Air Ministry by the War Artists' Advisory Committee, WAAC. Henderson was sent to RAF bases in Scotland but was frustrated to find that William Rothenstein, although not contracted to WAAC at the time, had already visited many of the same bases and made many of the portrait drawings Henderson was due to paint. This led Henderson to concentrate on ground crew, aircraft hangars, repair shops and runways. Although the painting An Improvised Test of an Under-carriage provoked fury in the Air Ministry and contributed to Henderson's six-month contract not being extended, it was among the artworks shown at the first WAAC Britain at War exhibition at the Museum of Modern Art in New York in May 1941.[14] The painting shows a man jumping up and down on the wing of a Lockheed Hudson to test the undercarriage.[15]

Although disappointed his appointment had not been extended, Henderson continued to paint war subjects.[16] Among these paintings was Loading Gantry for Pluto, which shows the giant gantry at W. T. Glover and Co. used for preparing the cables to be laid under the Channel to supply fuel to Allied forces in France.[17]

Later life

After the Second World War Henderson continued to paint, although his style changed somewhat. By the 1970s he was painting groups of figures in minimal settings, often against all-white backgrounds. His wife, Helen died in 1971 "after nearly sixty perfectly wonderful years together".[18] After an interval of great heart searching he moved to London, having sold their Scottish home and his complete collection of pictures and books.[18] During the last twenty years of his life, Henderson engraved over sixty illustrations for a book on Assyrian, Egyptian and Greek mythology which he titled Creatures and Personages, but which remained unpublished at the time of his death.[3]

He was an active member, and major benefactor, of the Royal Watercolour Society until his death in 1982 in South Africa.[19] Works by Henderson are held in numerous Scottish collections, as well as the Imperial War Museum,[20] the RAF Museum[17] and the National Gallery of Canada.[14]

Bibliography

All entries are illustrated by Keith Henderson, the first four with colour plates, the remainder with pen-and-ink drawings or engravings in black-and-white, unless otherwise stated.[18]

The Romaunt of the Rose:As Byrde in Bour
Under the Greenwood Tree:Another Meeting
The Worm Ouroboros:King Gorice XII in Cärce

*Untraceable (this is a footnote to the bibliography in the ABMR article.[18]) There is a book which may match the above entry: Catalogue of a Collection of Mexican and other American Antiquities (including the Chavero Collection) in the possession of Viscount Cowdray edited by Thomas Athol Joyce. This however is undated and the illustrations are unattributed. Copies are in the British Museum and the British Library.

Other works and illustrations

References

  1. ↑ Brian Stewart & Mervyn Cutten (1997). The Dictionary of Portrait Painters in Britain up to 1920. Antique Collectors' Club. ISBN 1 85149 173 2.
  2. ↑ Aberdeen Art Gallery. "Keith Henderson Watercolours". Aberdeen Art Gallery. Retrieved 24 December 2013.
  3. 1 2 3 Alan Horne (1994). The Dictionary of 20th Century British Book Illustrators. Antique Collectors' Club. ISBN 1 85149 108 2.
  4. ↑ "Keith Henderson". Benezit Dictionary of British Graphic Artists and Illustrators, Volume 1 (OUP). 2012. Retrieved 24 December 2013.
  5. ↑ Imperial War Museum. "Search the collection, Keith Henderson". Imperial War Museum. Retrieved 22 November 2013.
  6. ↑ "A War of the Imagination:-The Experience of British Artists in Two World Wars". Vortex 3 (University of the West of England). Retrieved 24 December 2013.
  7. ↑ David Buckman (1998). Artists in Britain Since 1945 Vol 1, A to L. Art Dictionaries Ltd. ISBN 0 95326 095 X.
  8. ↑ "Brief Biography Keith Henderson". The Modernist Journals Project. Retrieved 24 December 2013.
  9. ↑ "Royal Academy". The Times. 4 May 1931. Retrieved 3 March 2014.
  10. ↑ "Mr. Keith Henderson". The Times. 19 November 1929. p. 14. Retrieved 3 March 2014.
  11. ↑ Henderson, Keith (1927-08-20). "An Empire Poster". The Times. Retrieved 3 March 2014.
  12. ↑ Peter J.M. McEwan (1994). The Dictionary of Scottish Art and Architecture. Antique Collectors' Club. ISBN 1 85149 134 1.
  13. ↑ Paul Harris & Julian Halsby (1990). The Dictionary of Scottish Painters 1600 to the Present. Canongate. ISBN 1 84195 150 1.
  14. 1 2 Brain Foss (2007). War paint: Art, War, State and Identity in Britain, 1939–1945. Yale University Press. ISBN 978-0-300-10890-3.
  15. ↑ An Improvised Test of an Under-carriage, Keith Henderson, Imperial War Museum, retrieved 24 December 2013
  16. ↑ "War artists archive – Keith Henderson". Imperial War Museum. Retrieved 24 December 2013.
  17. 1 2 "Your Paintings:Keith Henderson". BBC/ Public Catalogue Foundation. Retrieved 24 December 2013.
  18. 1 2 3 4 5 Antiquarian Book Monthly Review (ABMR) November 1975 Vol II No 11 Issue 21
  19. ↑ Sarah Colegrave. "Warthogs (c.1970, United Kingdom)". CADA Art & Antique Fair. Retrieved 11 June 2014.
  20. ↑ "Collection Search, Keith Henderson". Imperial War Museum. Retrieved 24 December 2013.
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