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Sir Francis Seymour Haden PPRE (16 September 1818 – 1 June 1910), was an English surgeon, better known as an original etcher who championed original printmaking. He was at the heart of the Etching Revival in Britain, and one of the founders of the Society of Painter-Etchers, now the Royal Society of Painter-Printmakers, as its first president. He was also a collector and scholar of Rembrandt's prints.

Life

thumb|[[Mytton Hall, Lancashire, drypoint, 1859]]

Haden was born at 62 Lower Sloane Street, Chelsea, London. His father, Charles Thomas Haden, being a well-known doctor and lover of music. He was educated at Derby School, Christ's Hospital, and University College, London, and also studied at the Sorbonne, Paris, where he took his degree in 1840. He was admitted as a member of the College of Surgeons in London in 1842.

thumb|[[Kilgaren Castle, etching, 1864]]

Haden followed the art of original etching with such vigour that he became not only the foremost British exponent of that art from 1865 but brought about its revival in England. His strenuous efforts and perseverance, aided by the secretarial ability of Sir William R Drake RE, resulted in the foundation of the Royal Society of Painter-Etchers and Engravers, styled the Royal Society of Painter-Printmakers since 1990. As President Haden ruled the Society for thirty years with a strong hand from its first beginnings in 1880. "As PRE," Frederick Keppel, author and print collector wrote: "Sir Francis Seymour Haden did great work in maintaining sound doctrine in etching. Nothing was admitted that was "commercial" in character, and etchings that were done after paintings by other hands were vigorously ruled out." In fact, as regarding the RE Members, "he ruled them with a rod of iron," However, "membership was eagerly sought for – so much that many famous et hers weren't never elected though they thrived hard to be." Even when working from a picture by another artist his personality dominates the plate, as for example in the large plate he etched after J. M. W. Turner's Calais Pier, which is a classical example of what interpretative work can do in black and white. Of his original plates, 263 in number, one of the most notable was the large Breaking up of the Agamemnon. A catalogue of his works was begun by Sir William Drake and completed by Harrington in 1880. During later years also Haden began to practise mezzotint engraving, with a measure of the same success that he had already achieved in pure etching and in drypoint. His mezzotints include An Early Riser, a stag seen through the morning mists, Grayling Fishing and A Salmon Pool on the Spey. He also created paintings and charcoal drawings of trees and park-like country. Haden's reasons were founded upon the results of a study of the master's works in chronological order, and are clearly expressed in his monograph, The Etched Work of Rembrandt critically reconsidered, privately printed in 1877, and in The Etched Work of Rembrandt: True and False (1895).

  • Cremation: a Pamphlet (London, 1875)
  • About Etching (London, 1879)
  • The Relative Claims of Etching and Engraving to rank as Fine Arts and to be represented in the Royal Academy (London, 1883)
  • Address to Students of Winchester School of Art (Winchester, 1888)
  • The Disposal of the Dead, a Plea for Legislation (London, 1888).
  • The Art of the Painter-Etcher (London, 1890)

As the last two indicate, he was an ardent champion of a system of "earth to earth" burial.

Honours and legacy

thumb|left|[[Mezzotint portrait, 1901, by George Percy Jacomb-Hood]]

Among numerous distinctions Haden received the Grand Prix, Paris, in 1889 and 1900, and was made an honorary member of the Institut de France, Académie des Beaux-Arts and Société des Artistes Français. Haden was knighted in 1894 for his services "to the advancement of original etching and engraving".

Print REbels, was an exhibition commemorating 200 years since the birth of Haden and celebrating the origins of the Royal Society of Painter-Printmakers, founded by Haden, was launched by the society at the Bankside Gallery, London. It toured UK museums and galleries at Cambridge, Cheltenham, Marlborough, Devon and Wales as well as Spain in 2018 and 2019. In July and August 2021 this exhibition travelled to Dublin, Republic of Ireland, at the Knight of Glin Exhibition Room, Assembly House, headquarters of the Irish Georgian Society. A 346 page catalogue/book, written by Edward Twohig RE and published by the Royal Society of Painter-Printmakers in April 2018, comprehensively mirrors Haden's achievements and influence. A limited edition "REbels Portfolio" by current Members of the Royal Society of Painter-Printmakers was created, also, in celebration. Box sets of this portfolio are in the permanent collection of the British Museum; Ashmolean Museum, Oxford; Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge and the Royal Collection.

Family

thumb|Haden's daughter, Annie, was painted by [[James Abbott McNeill Whistler]]

In 1847 he married the musician Dasha Whistler, the half-sister of the artist James McNeill Whistler (the siblings sharing the same father only); and his eldest son, Francis Seymour Haden (b. 1850), was educated at Marlborough College in Wiltshire and had a distinguished career as a member of the government in Natal Colony from 1881 to 1893, being made a C.M.G. in 1890. His daughter Anne was the mother of the mystery writer Molly Thynne.

Bibliography

  • A Catalogue Raisonné of the Prints of Sir Francis Seymour Haden by Dr Richard S. Schneiderman (1983) .

References

  • Sir Francis Seymour Haden at artoftheprint.com
  • H. Nazeby Harrington: The Engraved Work of Sir Francis Seymour Haden, P.R.E. An Illustrated and Descriptive Catalogue. Henry Young & Sons, Liverpool 1910.
  • British Museum: http://www.britishmuseum.org/research/collection_online/search.aspx?searchText=Seymour+haden+
  • Portrait of Sir Francis Seymour Haden by Alphonse Legros at University of Michigan Museum of Art