GORE, Spencer Frederick - b. 1878 Epsom, d. 1914 Surrey

English painter, known for his landscapes, music-hall scenes, and interiors. He also occasionally painted still-lifes. He was the son of Spencer Walter Gore, the winner of the first Wimbledon tennis championship in 1877 and nephew of Charles Gore, Bishop of Oxford. He was an important member of Walter Sickert’s circle and Gore’s enthusiasm for his work helped Sickert to decide to return to Britain from France.

Gore was a founding member of the Allied Artists’ Association in 1908, of the Camden Town Group in 1911, and of the London Group in 1913. His early work is impressionistic but his later work was influenced by the work he saw in Roger Fry’s Post-Impressionistic exhibitions, employing flat, bright colour and boldly simplified forms. He died of pneumonia in Richmond, Surrey, at the young age of 35.

Mornington Crescent

Spencer Gore was one of the most important English artists in the opening years of the twentieth century. In 1911 he was the president of the Camden Town Group, which was the seed of the influential London Group that would emerge in 1913. He studied at the Slade, where he met Harold Gilman and Wyndham Lewis, who were among the first members of the London Group.