Sir Alfred Munnings
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Sir Alfred Munnings KCVO PRA |
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Alfred Munnings Reading Aloud Outside on the Grass, c. 1911, by Harold Knight.
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| Born |
Alfred James Munnings 8 October 1878 Mendham, Suffolk, England |
| Died | 17 July 1959 (aged 80) Dedham, Essex, England |
| Nationality | British |
| Known for | Painting |
| Movement | Newlyn School |
Sir Alfred James Munnings, KCVO, PRA (8 October 1878 – 17 July 1959) was known as one of England's finest painters of horses, and as an outspoken critic of Modernism. Engaged by Lord Beaverbrook's Canadian War Memorials Fund, he earned several prestigious commissions after the Great War that made him wealthy.
Alfred Munnings was born on 8 October 1878 at Mendham Mill, Mendham, Suffolk, across the River Waveney from Harleston in Norfolk. His father was the miller and Alfred grew up surrounded by the activity of a busy working mill with horses and horse-drawn carts arriving daily. At fourteen he was apprenticed to a Norwich printer, designing and drawing advertising posters for the next six years, attending the Norwich School of Art in his spare time. When his apprenticeship ended, he became a full-time painter. The loss of sight in his right eye in an accident in 1898 did not deflect his determination to paint, and in 1899 two of his pictures were shown at the Royal Academy Summer Exhibition. He painted rural scenes, frequently of subjects such as Gypsies and horses. He was associated with the Newlyn School of painters, and while there met Florence Carter-Wood (1888–1914), a young horsewoman and painter. They married on 19 January 1912 but she tried to kill herself on their honeymoon and did so in 1914. Munnings bought Castle House, Dedham, in 1919, describing it as 'the house of my dreams'. He used the house and adjoining studio extensively throughout the rest of his career, and it was opened as the Munnings Art Museum in the early 1960s, after Munnings' death. Munnings remarried in 1920; his second wife was another horsewoman, Violet McBride. There were no children from either marriage. Although his second wife encouraged him to accept commissions from society figures, Munnings became best known for his equine painting: he often depicted horses participating in hunting and racing.
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