Bayes Artists
A talented family of artists called Bayes; including painters and a sculptor. They originally hailed from Lumbutts, just outside Todmorden, Yorkshire, in the North of England.
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Alfred Walter Bayes R.E.
(1831-1909)
(R.E. - Member of the Royal Society of Painter-Etchers and Engravers).
(I am indebted to Clare Ash for this photograph of A.W.Bayes)
Born in the village of Lumbutts, near Todmorden, (in those days the town lay astride the border of Lancashire & Yorkshire).
A 'Painter in Oil Colours', (of genre, portraits, biblical subjects, landscapes and angling scenes), Etcher and Engraver.
He was the son of enlightened parents, cordwainer, William Bayes (1799-1851) and Hannah (nee Uttley, 1788-1856) who formed their own school, library and museum in a purpose built building behind their house in Lumbutts. Hannah was a Schoolteacher at this school and in 1851, when he was 19, Alfred taught at this Lumbutts School. In fact, the whole family took part in teaching. (The Board School was not in existence at Lumbutts until 1878).
In order to advance his artistic career, Alfred Bayes moved to London where he attended Heatherleys Art School, paying his way by making illustrations, notably for the Dalziel brothers to engrave. He produced 290 drawings for the Complete Illustrated Stories of Hans Christian Andersen.
He exhibited in the Royal Academy (1858-1908), the British Institution (1859-1867), also the Society of British Artists and the New Watercolour Society. In 1900 he was elected as a Member of the Royal Society of Painter-Etchers.
Shown left is 'Day Dreams', (c.1902), which can be seen in the York City Art Gallery.
There is also a painting of a Chartists Meeting, held in 1842 at the Basin Stone on the hills above Walsden. This painting is in the Mayor's Parlour at Todmorden Town Hall and I note that it has been used on the front cover of a book called: "Chartism: A New History" by Malcom Chase, (Manchester University Press, 2007).
If you need any information about the area, I can heartily recommend a really useful website called 'Todmorden and Walsden'.
It includes a family history under 'People', called "The Bayes Saga" written by Jessie Bayes.
The ladies who compile this site were happy for me to copy these images from there, they show paintings by A.W.Bayes. They are of 'Hand Weaving' (right) and the other (left) is of 'Kilnhurst'.
In 1865, he married Emily Fielden, who was born in Todmorden, in 1837 and is pictured (right).
She died in 1924.
Alfred and Emily had six children, two dying shortly after birth.
The four surviving children are pictured below:
Emmeline (born St. Pancras, London, in 1867, d.1957),
Walter John (1869-1956),
Gilbert William (1872-1953) and
Jessie (1876-1970).
I am indebted to Clare Ash for this portrait of the four children of Alfred and Emily Bayes. It was taken c.1900 and shows, (L-R), Jessie, Walter, Emmie and Gilbert.
Emmeline Bayes 1867-1957
'Emmie', the eldest daughter, who did what was expected in a Victorian family. She ran the household, helping to run the many parties the family had with fellow members of their artistic world. Particularly so, after the family financial disaster. Her Father had all his assets in the Liberator Building Society. This collapsed in 1892, the family lost all their money and they had to 'let the servants go'.
Emily, her Mother, was more than happy for Emmie to take on the domestic work and after Emily became old and confused, she looked after her too.
Like the rest of her siblings, she had artistic talent. After the Liberator collapse, she found time to do a French Couture course, as she was always a fine needlewoman and set up a business as a professional dressmaker to bring money in. She made a success of this for several years.
In 1912, to the surprise of those around her, at the age of 45, she married a neighbour, John Stacey Aumonier, an artist known as 'Jack'. (The family were artists and jewellers, the name is of Huguenot origin).
After her Mother died in 1924, Emmeline was able to take up wood carving, silver work and enamelling.
Walter John BAYES R.W.S.
(31st May 1869 - 21st January 1956)
(RWS - Royal Society of painters in Water Colours)
(Again, I am grateful to Clare Ash who provided me with the photo of Walter and Kate (Kitty) Bayes, (above), also the photo, (below), of Walter Bayes in his studio).
A painter, etcher, illustrator, theatrical scenery designer and also a lecturer and writer on artistic subjects. He studied in the evenings at the City and Guilds Technical College, Finsbury 1886-1900 and then at Westminster School of Art, 1900-2.
He was a founder member of the Camden Town Group (1911) and of the London Group of Artists in 1913.
Born in London, he married his model, Catharine (Kate or Kitty) Telfer in 1904.
He taught at the City & Guilds Institute, at the Camberwell School of Arts and Crafts, he was a highly regarded teacher as the Headmaster of Westminster School of Art (1918-1934) and Lecturer on perspective to the Royal Academy and Slade School and Director of Painting at Lancaster School of Arts and Crafts 1944-1949.
As a critic, he rendered to his fellow artists what Walter Sickert called;
"the incalculable service of speaking the truth as he conceives it."
Walter Bayes was Art Critic of the Athenæum magazine (1906-1916) and contributed to the Outlook, the Saturday Review and the Weekend Review. His writings were pugnacious, (according to John Rothenstein in his book - Modern English Painters), and often obscure.....
"I have read your Athenæum artical", Sickert would tell him, "I read it three times and I believe, I am proud to believe, that I understand it!"
Walter Bayes' depiction of "The Underworld", (part of which is shown left), is a large painting of Londoners sheltering from an WW1 air-raid in the Elephant & Castle Tube station. This was exhibited in the Academy of 1918 and bought for the Imperial War Museum.
It has been restored and in a recent family visit to the Imperial War Museum in London in February 2020, we saw it on display in the main foyer.
He is also represented in the Imperial War Museum by a design for a tapestry of "Survivors from a Torpedoed Ship" and "The Armoured Fighting Vehicle School, Bovington: lunch on the driving grounds." I don't know whether or not these paintings are on display.
He exhibited at all the major London galleries and some provincial galleries. His publications include 'The Art of Decorative Painting' (1926), 'Turner, a speculative portrait' (1931) and 'A Painter's Baggage' (1932).
His Obituary from the London Times.
Gilbert William BAYES
P.R.B.S., H.R.I.
(4th April 1872 - 10th July 1953).
PBRS - President of the Royal Society of British Sculpters HRI - Honorary member of the Royal Institute of Painters in Watercolours). Elected member of the Art Workers Guild 1896 and Master of the Guild 1925-26.
A sculptor in Bronze and an architectural and monumental designer.
Born in St. Pancras, London, Gilbert Bayes married fellow sculptor, Gertrude Smith in 1906. He studied at the City and Guilds College, Finsbury, and at the RA Schools, 1896-9. After winning the Gold Medal and Travelling Scholarship, 1899, he studied in Paris and exhibited at the 1900 Exposition Universale.
His fine art work was often inspired by the classics and Wagner's operas, but his architectural and public sculpture was more conventional in subject and style.
Gilbert Bayes designed many medals and trophies, including the Great Seal of King George V and the Seagrave Trophy. He sculpted the figures of Sir Charles Barry and Sir William Chambers which are on the Victoria and Albert Museum in London.
Also the Rood at St. Mary's Church, Primrose Hill, London (c.1914) and the Queen of Time, the Great Clock at Selfridges Department Store in London (c.1925).
His work includes friezes for the BBC, on the Saville Theatre and in 1939 at Royal Doulton House on the Albert Embankment, London. Royal Doulton House was demolished in 1978, but Bayes' frieze was saved and is in the Victoria and Albert Museum, my photo, (right), shows part of the freize. In fact, there is now a Sculpture Gallery in the V&A named after Gilbert Bayes).
He also produced the stone relief of sporting figures (1934) outside Lord's Cricket ground and various War Memorials including figures for the memorial at his parent's home town of Todmorden, (see below).
The unveiling took place on 10th Dec 2007 and I was lucky enough to have been invited.
Louise Irving, co-author of the book on Gilbert Bayes (see Bibliography below) gave a short address before the unveiling, especially noting that the blue enamelled ceramic plaque was a fitting tribute to a man who excelled in that medium. (See the Doulton frieze, shown above and now in the Victoria & Albert Museum, also the many colourful architectural items he produced in coloured ceramics).
Also present, lurking in the garden at the rear, was Gilbert Bayes' statue of 1929, "The Great Pan". His magnificence is pictured, (right).
Gilbert Bayes was honoured by the unveiling of a Blue Plaque on his old home at 4 Greville Place, St. John's Wood, London NW6. The building is now known as Bayes House (see lower - left), he lived there from 1931 until his death in 1953.
In 1935, Gilbert Bayes designed a medal to commemorate the launching of the new Cunard ocean liner, the Queen Mary. In all, 3000 were struck in Bronze, each priced at 15 shillings each, (which now would be 75p), available from the Royal Mint, or on-board.
It was reported in October 1935 that they were 'still selling like hot cakes on every voyage'. The reverse shows a view of New York as if seen through the arches of the Bargate in Southampton.
(An Introduction to Commemmorative Medals - Christopher Eimer. Seaby 1989).
This medal, designed by Gilbert Bayes, was struck for the London & North East Railway to commemorate the 100th anniversary of the opening of it's ancestor, the Stockton and Darlington Railway, i.e. 1825 - 1925. It depicts Edward Pease the founder of the Company and also George Stephenson, who engineered the line and its locomotives.
I was delighted to find the plaster original of one of the faces of the medal in the York Railway Museum. The S&DR was the first public steam hauled railway in the world.
At Holme Lacy, (5m ESE of Hereford), in the churchyard of St. Cuthbert's, is a bronze monument, shown right, at the grave of Edwyn Scudamore Stanhope, 10th Earl of Chesterfield, (whose wife was the daughter of Lord Nunburnholme, see below).
There is also a statue (completed after Bayes' death by W.C.H.King) of philanthropic industrialist Robert Owen in Newtown, Powys, in Wales.
His work can be seen in St. Mary's Church, Hampstead, London.
In the churchyard of St. James Church, at Warter, (16 miles East of the City of York), are two beautiful life-size bronze statues by Gilbert Bayes. On the left, dated 1910, is the memorial at the grave of shipping magnate, Charles Henry Wilson, (1833-1907). He became Lord Nunburnholme in 1906 .
(Warter Church is a significant example of a Victorian Estate Church, now redundant, but is looked after by the Yorkshire Wolds Buildings Preservation Trust).
There are many examples of Gilbert Bayes' War Memorials. My photo on the left shows a favourite of mine, his superb War Memorial figure at Broughton, just East of Scunthorpe, Lincolnshire.
Another is at Todmorden, Yorkshire, (his parent's home town, 10 miles West of Halifax), collaborating with the architect Norman Thorpe. Two of the three statues were lost, but happily these have been copied and the monument restored. See the video of the re-dedication ceremony.
Pictured above, dated 1909, is the statue at the grave of Gerald Valerian Wilson, Lord Nunburnholme's third son, who died in Paris, aged 23, in 1908.
I am grateful to Jill Floyd, who sent me these wonderful images of Gilbert Bayes' War Memorial at Broadstone in Dorset, overlooking Poole Harbour. It is appropriately carved from Portland Stone, quarried just 25 miles away.
The memorial was unveiled on 2nd June 1920. The figure at the top of the memorial is called 'Memory'. Jill says that the Memorial was Scheduled as a Grade II on 26 March 2008. She has also arranged for the plaque, (right), to be added, ensuring people knew who designed and made this wonderful memorial. Well done, Jill!
The Queen of Time Clock (left) is over the main door of Selfridges department store in Oxford Street, London. Bayes constructed it of bronze and decorated it with blue faience, gold and Doulton Stoneware. It was completed in 1931.
The 'Hidden London' website says of it: "In the days before mobile phones, it was common practice to arrange a rendezvous beneath some well-known clock and in October 1931 Selfridges unveiled what one writer called ‘London’s newest meeting place’. Other commentators hailed it as ‘one of the sights of London’ and a ‘horological masterpiece’. Nowadays most Oxford Street shoppers barely notice it."
Tom Tremayne has written and produced an excellent biographical film called:
"Gilbert Bayes - Maker of images".
It is presented by Wayne Hemingway. Watch it here
See also the Gilbert Bayes Trust's website: and his Obituary in the London Times.
Bibliography:
Gilbert Bayes - Sculptor 1872-1953
By Louise Irvine and Paul Atterbury in association with Peyton Skipwith and contributions by Philip Attwood, Michael Barker and Benedict Read.
Published by Richard Dennis 1998. ISBN 0-903685-64-7
A superb record of Bayes’s distinctive contribution to British sculpture in a long and eventful career spanning the Arts and Crafts Movement, Art Nouveau, Art Deco and Modernism. 192pp, 16 pages of colour, 450 black and white illustrations.
Softback £17.50
Gilbert Bayes
By Philip Ward-Jackson, 1998. One of a series called 'Essays in the Study of Sculpture', published by the Henry Moore Sculpture Trust.
'12 pages, 23 black and white illustrations'.
(Well worth the price of £2.50. I bought my copy at the Henry Moore Institute in Leeds after visiting the Library, where the friendly and helpful staff helped me research Gilbert Bayes. The Library holds 9 boxes of papers of Gilbert Bayes, purchased from the Gilbert Bayes Charitable Trust in 1999).
One of the many ornamental mooring rings that can be found on both sides of the London Embankment.
They were made in bronze, to Gilbert Bayes' design in c.1911.
Jessie BAYES
R.M.S
(Born 18 Nov 1876, Hampstead, London.
Died 31 Mar 1970, Paddington, London).
My thanks to Clare Ash for this lovely photo of Jessie Bayes.
A modern English Miniaturist Painter and designer in the Arts and Crafts style, who exhibited at the Royal Academy from 1908.
She was made a full member of the Royal Society of Miniature Painters, Sculpters and Gravers (RMS) in 1906 and was on the Council of the Society from 1925 until 1935. (Thanks to Pam Henderson, Exec. Sec. of the RMS for this information).
She was a member of the Church Crafts League.
A 1937 example of her work, are the paintings on a font cover depicting the childhood of Christ, (left). These can be seen at the lovely Church of St. Mary and St. Andrew at Stoke Rochford in Lincolnshire.
There must be about two dozen beautiful panels on the font cover, one of which is shown (far right).
(Stoke Rochford is 5 miles South of Grantham).
A web page showing some beautiful altar-pieces by Jessie Bayes in Montreal has sadly now disappeared. She made two visits to the New World in the 1920s to exhibit and sell her work.
I have discovered on the internet, (on a page called 'Church Stained Glass Windows by Robert Eberhard'), that Jessie Bayes designed some stained glass windows for the firm of Goddard and Gibbs which were installed in St. Luke's Church, Grayshott, Hampshire.
She also designed windows for St. David's Church at Miskin, near Llantristant about 12 miles West of Cardiff.
There is a large memorial to Frank Macrae (d. 1915) with an inset painting of St. George by Jessie Bayes, which is in the north aisle of St. Peter's Church, Cranley Gardens, Chelsea, London.
(In January 1973 the last Anglican service was held in the church and its parish was united with that of St. Mary, The Boltons. In June 1975, however, St. Peter's was re-consecrated as the Cathedral Church of the Armenians in London).
I was contacted by Ian Lewis, who has been researching the War memorials of Lakeland for some time.
At Flookburgh, in Cumbria, he found what he describes as a stunning Roll of Honour executed c.1919 by Jessie Bayes.
Ian was kind enough to send me a photograph (left).
Ian was obviously interested to know more about Jessie Bayes and found my old site in his searches and I'm glad to say, sent me the photo and information on this Flookburgh work.
(Flookburgh is 4 miles West of Grange over Sands, on the coast of Morecambe Bay).
Mark Rathbone contacted me, kindly allowing me to include this picture (right) of another beautiful painting by Jessie Bayes for a memorial to Mark's grandfather, Percy Rathbone, who died in 1926.
The memorial was commissioned by Percy Rathbone's widow. This initial painting was for design approval. A larger version was subsequently painted at the Church of St. Martin at Epsom, Surrey, on to a pillar near the choir stall where Percy Rathbone sang tenor for many years. The picture shows angels holding a chalice to illustrate the line in the Holy Communion service, "Now with angels and archangels and all the company of heaven".
A Bayes Family Exhibition
This was formally opened on Friday, 9th May 2008 at the Community College, Burnley Road, Todmorden.
Many Bayes family members were there and as I was there too, it was a pleasure to meet them, (I am just a namesake, but was happy to be able to contribute a few photographs).
It was a fascinating exhibition of 136 illustrations celebrating the lives and work of this talented artistic family. Although it was only open for two weeks there, it will be displayed elsewhere in the Libraries of Calderdale in the future. The illustrations there were photographs of paintings, sculptures, etc. made by the family, as well as background information, maps, letters, etc.
(The members of the Todmorden based 'Bayes Family Exhibition Committee' should be congratulated for their efforts. This excellent exhibition was a result of their many years of interest and research).
Oh dear.... I have only just noticed that the web address for this page has a typo. Instead of artistics, it's called artisitics! Too late to change now, I suppose...........
Jack Bayes here!
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