John Hassall by William H. P. Crewdson http://www.abmr.co.uk/hassall.html

Born at Walmer, on the 21st of May, 1868, John Hassall was the eldest son of Lieutenant Christopher Clark Hassall R. N., of a Cheshire family of wine-merchants, and his wife, Louisa, daughter of the Rev. Joseph Butterworth Owen, incumbent of St. Jude's, Chelsea.

Hassall's father had served in the fleet at the siege of Sevastapol, and was paralysed as the result of an accident on board ship; he died at the age of thirty-eight.

His widow married an officer in the Royal Marines at Chatham, who later became General Sir William Purvis Wright, K.C.B. After attending school at Worthing, Sussex, he went to Newton Abbot College, in Devon, where he had his first regular lessons in drawing. At this early stage of his life he had no ambitions of being an artist; only drawing for his own amusement, and he received no artistic training during this early period.

When in later life he recalled those school years, he wrote: "I must confess, I liked the drawing lesson better than Greek, but I fear I learned nothing of either that has been of much service to me since". From Newton Abbot, he went to Neuenheim College, Heidelburg, where he spent three of the happiest years of his life. Intended by his stepfather for the army, John Hassall failed twice in the examinations, and felt his failure bitterly.

One of the examinations for Sandhurst at which he failed was in freehand drawing, where he came second to last out of two hundred candidates. In 1888, John and his younger brother Owen were sent by their mother on a cattle-boat to a ranch in Manitoba, Canada, to study farming. For a time he acted as a path-finder to a tribe of Sioux Indians, and in spirit remained so all his life.

Even as a farmer, he continued to ply his pencil for the amusement of himself and his friends; "One thing I have to thank Manitoba for, and that is, that the loneliness of the long winter evenings, and the lack of society, made me hunt about for something to occupy my time". The opportunity to show his work to a greater audience came with the opening of an agricultural exhibition at Minnedosa, a small prairie town about 140 miles west of Winnipeg, which was the nearest community to the artist's homestead.

For the encouragement of prairie art, three prizes were offered for the best pictures submitted. ‘Sending in Day’ saw Hassall driving into Minnedosa on a cart, at the bottom of which lay his three works of art. These were duly exhibited, and carried off the three prizes, the highest being the sum of sixteen dollars. A year later, a second exhibition was held, and Hassall again received all the prizes, to the despair of Minnedosian art circles.

On the approach of the third exhibition, a deputation waited upon him, and suggested that it would be a graceful act on his part to retire from the contest, so far as the first prize was concerned, in favour of the daughter of the local Methodist parson. It was also pointed out to him that the continued success of this intruding Englishman was causing something of a slump in native art. Hassall at once fell in with their request, and clerical circles in Minnedosa were presently gratified by the news that their candidate had received the first award. It was through the habit of sketching for his own amusement that Hassall discovered his true bent.

Having made some sketches of the Christmas festivities at the Canadian farmstead, he posted the drawings to the editor of the Daily Graphic, rather for the purpose of showing how Christmas was celebrated in the new country than with an eye for possible business. One can well imagine his surprise when a copy of the paper arrived, dated 26th February, 1890, bearing his illustrations, and later when a cheque followed. He also had some pictures accepted by Punch soon afterwards.

This was to be the deciding point in Hassall's career. It so happened, that for various reasons the affairs of the farm were not too prosperous. One or two of his friends stated their surprise that a man who could make money so easily by drawing pictures should stay farming in exile. Hassall agreed with his friends, and a few days later he was on his way back to England with the intention of doing for a living, that which he had previously done for amusement.

"I came back to England, went home to my people at Deal, and spent the next month or two making little sea sketches. Then I began to see that, to a certain extent, I was wasting my time. If I was to do anything in the art world, I must get some training by hook or by crook". Casting about for advice, he obtained a letter of introduction to the veteran Royal Academician, Sidney Cooper; on the strength of which he travelled to Canterbury to submit examples of his work and receive a verdict upon their merits and the possibilities which lay before him.

Cooper looked at the drawings, pronounced them extremely bad, and recommended him to give up all idea of becoming an artist. Although this was not an encouraging start, Hassall was not to be put off, and sought for further, and, as he hoped, different advice. Someone told him that there was a free School of Art at Antwerp, having crossed to Antwerp, he presented himself at the Academy: "They asked me if I had any sketches, and I said I had not.

While they were trying to make me understand that they must have something in proof of my aptitude, and while I was trying to make them understand that any sketches I had were in England, an old man came along. He was obviously well known there, and, indeed, as I learned afterwards, was on a visit of inspection".

The 'Old Man' was Professor van Havermaet, who declared that Hassall was not advanced enough, and suggested that he take some private lessons from his son Charles; and it was to him that Hassall gratefully acknowledged that his subsequent success was primarily due. These preliminary studies lasted for three months, with the result that when he entered the Academy he soon rose to the top of the life-class. After two sessions, he proceeded to the Academie Julian in Paris, to study under Bougereau and Ferrier: whilst there he became familiar with Art Nouveau and the work of Alphonse Mucha. Hassall stayed in Paris for six months, then returned to the Academy at Antwerp.

Feeling his feet, he resumed the postponed project which he had blithely come from Canada to carry out': "I was going to be a great artist, of course. The kind of artist who paints enormous pictures, and gets infinitesimal prices for them, or fails to sell them at all". He made his first, and only, appearance at the Royal Academy in 1894, with two oil-paintings — ‘Birds of Prey’, representing a meeting of a gang of Nihilists, and ‘Temporary Insanity’, showing a despairing woman who is about to asphyxiate herself with charcoal fumes. He returned to London, but learned that to exhibit a picture is an easier matter than to sell it; and it was brought home to him with considerable force that the artist's craft is one which entails as much hard work, and certainly as much disappointment, as any other, to be successfully pursued. — "I could not afford to spend six months upon a painting , as I had done upon 'Birds of Prey', so I turned for immediate results to black-and-white work, and I can truthfully say that I was, metaphorically speaking, kicked out of every editorial office in London".

The Sketch, always keen to discover and ready to employ new talent, published one of his illustrations in the issue of March 7th, 1894. His work for the illustrated papers steadily increased, and in 1895 his work was appearing in Pick-Me-Up, the New Budget, Judy and Moonshine. It was also in 1895 that he discovered his most successful vein. That discovery came with the receipt of a circular which the well known colour printers, David Allen & Sons, had sent out to a number of artists on the subject of artistic designs for the purpose of commercial placards.

"Dudley Hardy had turned his attention to Posters, and the idea stuck me that I would have a shot. I designed one and sent it along". In reply, Hassall received a request to call at the offices of Messrs. Allen & Son, with the result that he was commissioned to do a poster in black and yellow for the popular musical comedy ‘The French Maid’. It was not long before his posters were in constant demand, and his work was seen from almost every street hoarding. He received a request from Judson's, creators of Moonlight Soup, to design them some thing which would make the whole British public mad to taste their wares. He designed posters for Colman's Mustard, Nestle's Milk, the British Vacuum Cleaner Co., Bisto Gravy, Sunlight Soap, Andrew's Liver Salts, to name but a few: he also designed the posters for many of the Drury Lane productions, including the pantomime 'Peter Pan'.

He remained with Messrs. Allen & Son for seven years, during which time he designed over 600 posters, earning him the title of 'the poster king'. About 1899, he began working as an illustrator of children's books, A Cockney in Arcadia, by H.A. Spurr (1899), By the Way Ballads, by W. Sapte (1901), Grimm's Fairy Tales, (1902), to name just three. Hassall also became well known as the designer of book covers; he designed the binding case for the first volume of the boys weekly The Captain in 1899; some of his other work is listed at the end of the article. In addition to the designing and illustrating of other peoples books, he also produced his own, they include; — An Active Army Alphabet, (1899), A Naval Alphabet, (1901), John Hassall's New Picture Book, (1908), The Hassall Painting Book, (1915). His illustrations for boys adventure stories were usually executed in watercolour. In 1901, he was elected a member of the Royal Institute of Painters in Watercolours and the Royal Miniature Society.

Hassall was one of the first members of the London Sketch Club, becoming President in1903, and was a close friend of fellow members Cecil Aldin, Rene Bull, Dudley Hardy and Phil May. He was a member of the Masonic Pen and Brush Lodge, Knights of Ye Round Table, Odd Volumes; he was an active member of the Savage Club, which he joined in 1906. He designed some menus around 1908-1910, and chaired a dinner there in 1915.

For many years he delighted Saturday night audiences there with his sketches in chalks, done to slow music on the piano. Hassall's work was by this time appearing in numerous magazines, both in the juvenile and adult market, they include: The New Budget, The West End Review, The Graphic, Illustrated Bits, The Idler, Eureka, Illustrated London News, The Sphere, The Boy's Own Paper, The Captain, Cassell's Magazine, The Flag, Holly Leaves, Judy, Little Folks, London Opinion, The Pall Mall Magazine, Pearson's Magazine, The Poster, Printer's Pie, St. Paul's Magazine, The Sketch, The Strand Magazine, The Tatler: and in the following annuals; The Happy Annual, Pear's Annual, Boy's Own Annual, Blackie's Children's Annual, and Cassell's Annual for Boys and Girls.

The artist was once asked by one of the leading journals: "How do you begin work? Do you have the whole thing in your mind, procure suitable models, make studies, and then begin on your picture, or what?" Hassall replied: "Well, I suppose I am the most unconventional artist in London. I never use a model, unless it be to ask someone about the house to hold their arm up-so-for a minute, or something of that sort. I seem to memorise everything. I never forget an impression. I can reproduce every detail of anything that I have seen once. It is impossible to say how these things are done, but I suppose the fact that I would do hundreds of hands, say, a week, in my student days, accounts for much. I suppose it is a species of memory, mixed with imagination".

He then showed the interviewer a pile of drawings "That's Cecil Aldin, that's Tom Browne, that's Phil May, that's Rene Bull, that's Dudley Hardy, that's Haiti", and so he continued through about 40 names well known in the art world, producing a picture for everyone. "These are the pictures of the Spoof Exhibition held at the dinner of the Sketch Club the other night.

They were all stuck all round the room and caused no end of fun". "But-did-Aldin and Browne and the rest do them?". "Oh no. Another fellow and myself did them all, just taking off the different well-known styles of the members of the Sketch Club. I just showed them to you to illustrate what I said about memory, for I have not the slightest doubt it is that which stands me in such good stead".