Simon Elwes

Lt. Col. Simon Edmund Vincent Paul Elwes, (29 June 1902 – 6 August 1975) was a British war artist and society portrait painter whose patrons included presidents, kings, queens, statesmen, sportsmen, prominent social figures and many members of the British Royal Family. He was a favorite of Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother. Biography Elwes (pronounced "El-wez") was born on 29 June 1902 at Hothorpe Hall in Northamptonshire (also near Theddingworth, Leicestershire), the sixth and youngest son (two daughters were born later) of famed tenor Gervase Cary Elwes (1866–1921), and his wife, Lady Winifride Mary Elizabeth Feilding, daughter of the 8th Earl of Denbigh. He was the scion of the recusant Cary-Elwes family, of which many branches are known simply as "Elwes", which includes noted British monks and bishops, such as Abbot Columba Cary-Elwes, Bishop of Northampton Dudley Cary-Elwes and Father Luke Cary-Elwes. His niece, Polly Elwes, was a television personality in Britain. Two of his grandsons are the English actor Cary Elwes and English artist Luke Elwes. Elwes' mother was so determined to have a painter in the family she studied art and herself started painting while pregnant. For his education Elwes first attended two Catholic schools, Ladycross School in Seaford, and the Oratory School in Edgbaston. In 1918, at the age of sixteen, he was taken out of the Oratory and installed in the Slade School of Fine Art where Henry Tonks and Philip Wilson Steer taught. After the Slade Elwes spent eight years in Paris, first at the Académie Delécluse and then at the Academie des Beaux Arts. While there he met a Belgian refugee, Mme. La Forge, who aroused his latent interest in painting. La Forge gave him the run of her studio and encouraged him to start again where he had left off. In 1920, Elwes began studying in earnest at Andre Lhote's Academy in Montparnasse, Paris. Fellow students included Henri Cartier-Bresson, Conrad O'Brien-ffrench and Elena Mumm Thornton Wilson. While in Paris Elwes did a black and white drawing of the Irish tenor and recording artist, John McCormack. McCormack would say to his wife of Elwes: "This lad has remarkable talent and will do big things, mark my words." From France Elwes visited art galleries in Germany, the Netherlands and Italy. In 1922, Elwes sailed to New York, having borrowed the fare. He repaid the loan by doing charcoal drawings at $5 to $20 apiece. During this visit he managed to draw President Harding from life.