1. Simon Elwes was a favourite of Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother.
22 Facts About Simon Elwes
1. 2.
Simon Elwes' mother was so determined to have a painter in the family she studied art and herself started painting while pregnant.
3.
In 1920, Simon Elwes began studying in earnest at Andre Lhote's Academy in Montparnasse, Paris.
4.
In 1922, Simon Elwes sailed to New York, having borrowed the fare.
5.
Simon Elwes repaid the loan by doing charcoal drawings at $5 to $20 apiece.
6.
In 1929, Simon Elwes was created a Knight of Malta and four years later was elected a member of the Royal Society of Portrait Painters.
7.
In 1930, Simon Elwes was invited to paint Robert Baden-Powell founder of the Scout movement.
8.
In 1936, Simon Elwes was commissioned to paint the then Duke of York, in uniform as colonel-in-chief of the 11th Hussars.
9.
At the outbreak of the Second World War, Simon Elwes initially joined the Welsh Guards.
10.
Simon Elwes was later transferred to the 10th Royal Hussars; he was stationed in North Africa and Egypt serving as a lieutenant colonel.
11.
Simon Elwes painted two other field marshals: Sir Claude Auchinleck and in India, Viceroy Archibald Wavell.
12.
In Delhi, Simon Elwes gave art lessons sponsored by Lady Wavell at the Viceregal Palace.
13.
In 1945, Simon Elwes suffered a near-fatal stroke which paralysed the right half of his face and body, including his painting hand.
14.
Simon Elwes spent two years in hospital recuperating and after receiving treatment from renowned physiotherapist Berta Bobath, was able to stand with the aid of a cane.
15.
Simon Elwes never regained the use of his right hand, but taught himself to paint with his left surmounting his disability enough to become president of the Guild of Catholic Artists, and vice-president of the Royal Society of Portrait Painters from 1953 to 1957.
16.
Simon Elwes had become enough of a celebrity himself that in 1949, whilst bedridden in the South of France after suffering a stroke, former British Prime Minister Winston Churchill told Lord Beaverbrook:.
17.
In 1953, Simon Elwes was commissioned by Queen Elizabeth to paint the 1948 investiture of her daughter, then Princess Elizabeth with the Order of the Garter by her father King George VI.
18.
In 1956, Simon Elwes was appointed an associate of the Royal Academy.
19.
Simon Elwes received a large commission by Viscount Camrose to do a conversation piece of leading members of White's club, of which he was a member.
20.
In 1960, Simon Elwes joined an exhibition of other portraitists at the Portraits, Inc gallery on West 51st St in Manhattan.
21.
In 1967, Simon Elwes was made a full member of the Royal Academy.
22.
Simon Elwes died on 6 August 1975, in Amberley, West Sussex.