Kathleen Temple-Bird

(1879 - 1962)

Mahatma Gandhi Spinning Yarn, c.1932

signed lower right 'K.E. Temple-Bird'

oil on board

29.5 x 25 cm.

Exhibited

New English Art Club – date unknown

1940 - Royal Academy Gem Room,
1942 - St.Ives' Society of Artists, Spring show,
1946 - Royal Society of Portrait Painters, 1946/47 - Art Exhibition Bureau (AEB) Tour of the country, a selection from the Royal Society of Portrait Painters' Exhibition of 1946,
1950 - Paris Salon,
1952 - Society of Women Artists,
1954 - Society of Women Artists.

A portrait of Mahatma Gandhi made by the British artist Clare Leighton during his visit to London for a round table conference on Indian Independence in 1931 sold for a record £130,000 at Bonhams in July this year and was reported as the only known portrait that Gandhi sat for at that time. However, suffragette artist Kathleen Temple-Bird also had access to Gandhi during his visit and according to the artist’s grandchildren, was particularly pleased with her portrait, signing a preliminary pencil sketch she made from life. The French government then bought the oil painting in 1934, which now belongs to the Centre Pompidou and the artist made this version to keep for herself. It has remained in the family collection until this year.

In 1921 Gandhi became leader of the Indian National Congress, which made a declaration of Indian independence from Britain in December 1929. The Indian National Congress had boycotted the first Round Table Conference for Independence, but in 1931 Gandhi was invited, and agreed, to attend the Second Round Table Conference in London and visited Britain from Sept-Dec 1931. Gandhi, distinctive in his usual dhoti and shawl was a regular feature in the newspaper reports of the Conference. During his stay he lived at Kingsley Hall in the East End of London, which was run as a community centre with a nursery school and social events, by sisters Muriel and Doris Lester. However, the journey from Bow to Central London and back for every meeting was too much, so his team set up an office at 88 Knightsbridge near Hyde Park for work, and he returned to Bow every night.

Kathleen Temple-Bird often painted notable figures of the time and, due to her politics (she was a suffragette and had worked with Emmeline Pankhurst’s Women’s Social and Political Union), was drawn to pioneering women, or people advancing progress for women. At some point during Gandhi’s visit, Kathleen sketched him and he sat for her. In Gandhi’s itinerary, there were many meetings organised where he could meet ordinary people, and local organisations. There are various likely opportunities for Kathleen to have met him in London relevant to her interests and contacts - a speech at Westminster School (where Kathleen’s son, John, was a student); a Quakers meeting at Friend’s House; a women’s reception organised by the Women’s Indian Association at the Central YMCA; a meeting of the Friends of India; and at Muriel Lester’s/Kingsley Hall in Bow. However, there is also evidence that artists were able to study Gandhi while he worked in his Knightsbridge office, which was close to where Kathleen lived at the time in Edith Grove, Chelsea.

In a history of his visit to Britain in 1931, it describes ‘... the early mornings when Mr. Gandhi arrived, and you felt as though a torchlike “something” had come into the house. He would spring out of his car and be up in his room sitting by the fire spinning, in a flash. In every corner of the room there were famous sculptors and artists trying to get a model or a picture of this elusive man. Strewn around were letters and cables needing immediate attention; members of the Conference seated on the floor, anxious to get his opinion...’

It was at one of these locations that Kathleen produced her first portrait of Gandhi - a graphite sketch. The second portrait she created was of Gandhi spinning, as seen here - so she was very likely one of the artists in his office. She would have worked up the finished oil portraits (of which she made two) in her studio in 1932. In 1934, the French Government purchased both her oil portrait and the graphite sketch, (price unknown) for permanent display in the Musée du Luxembourg, Paris – and specifically in the Jeu de Paume pavillion in Tuileries Gardens which was set up to house contemporary art from foreign schools of painting.

Kathleen was in communication with Madame Rose Valland at the time who was a volunteer curator there - she later became a French resistance fighter and played a decisive driving role in the safeguarding, recovery and restitution of looted works of art after the 2nd World War. The Gandhi portraits were on display until around 1937/39, and then the collections were transferred to the Musee d’Orsay and then to the National Museum of Modern Art, Centre Pompidou, Paris where they still reside.

As was common practice among artists, Kathleen produced the present work as a replica portrait to retain for herself, and this painting continued to be exhibited in the UK from 1940-1954, as well as the Paris Salon in 1950. She also exhibited another portrait study she had produced in chalk. The Revue des Arts wrote a letter to the Royal Institute of Oil Painters about Kathleen, some time shortly after the purchase of the original paintings by France, describing how “Colour can lie when it’s not supported by a strong drawing. [However], the fold of a mouth, a tired smile, the beginning of a gesture, blinking eyes behind glasses reveal to us the soul of ‘Mahatma Gandhi’. This work, small in size, but large through the interpretation of the sitter (world famous) is especially evocative of the painter’s talent.”

Kathleen Temple-Bird was an artist, teacher and exponent of Women's suffrage, designing posters for the cause between 1910-1915 and “putting her artistic skill to the service of the Cause by executing quick portrait sketches" that were then sold to raise funds and spread the word. Having been brought up in Ipswich, she trained at the Slade School of Art before travelling to France and Italy. She later travelled alone across Canada, becoming Head of Art at Havergal College, Toronto. She married in 1911 and settled in London, where she exhibited the majority of her paintings, but moved to St Ives for the duration of the Second World War.

Research sources:

- Christopher Finnigan, ‘1931: A visit from Gandhi’, Oct 2019, South Asia@LSE Blog [https://blogs.lse.ac.uk/southasia/2019/10/02/a-visit-from-gandhi/]

- James D Hunt, ‘Gandhi in London’, Ch7, p199, Internet Archive:

[https://archive.org/stream/in.ernet.dli.2015.502483/2015.502483.Gandhi-In_djvu.txt]

- ‘Mahatma Gandhi Events Chronology: Round Table Conference and London’, Gandhi Heritage Portal: [https://www.gandhiheritageportal.org/chronology/event-chronology-listing/MzQ=/NzQyMQ==#]

- Elizabeth Crawford, ‘Art and Suffrage: a biographical dictionary of suffrage artists’, 2018, Francis Boutle Publishers

- Jeu De Paume, ‘1862-2024: The History Of Jeu De Paume’ [https://jeudepaume.org/en/about- us/history/]

- Jeu De Paume, ‘Rose Valland, A Resistance Fighter at the Jeu de Paume’ [https://jeudepaume.org/a-propos/histoire/rose-valland/]

- Centre Pompidou, ‘Kathleen E Temple-Bird’ page: https://www.centrepompidou.fr/en/ressources/personne/cRy9b4