Person    | Male  Born 27/9/1883  Died 7/6/1969

Boris Anrep

Categories: Art, Craft / Design

Countries: Russia

Born Russia. Came to England in 1899 to learn English. Spent time in St Petersburg, Edinburgh and Paris. A 1904 visit to see the mosaics in Ravenna inspired his life's work. Became closely associated with the Bloomsbury Group. Served in the Russian army in WW1. Came to London in 1917 and never returned to Russia.

More mosaic works by Anrep are located on the roof terrace at One New Change and there are floors of his work in the main entrance to the National Gallery; the Blake Room in Tate Britain; the Bank of England entrance; the Greek Orthodox Saint Sophia Cathedral, Moscow Road; the Blessed Sacrament Chapel Westminster Cathedral. He created a work in the Notre Dame de France church in Leicester Place but this was covered, only four years later, with a work by Jean Cocteau. 2023: we've read that this front panel for the alter has now been restored. We must revisit.

Lived in Hampstead during most of WW2. He returned to Paris but returned to London after 1965, Hyde Park Gardens where he lived the last part of his life. We are grateful to London Historians’ member, Helen Szamuely, for much of this information.

A professional artist friend excuses her non-sporting inclinations by claiming that the two fields are mutually exclusive. Over many years we have failed to find a single example to prove her wrong, and then along comes Anrep: in 1920 he competed in the men's doubles at Wimbledon. But he is a rare exception to the rule. And in this context we must mention Yves Klein, the avant garde artist was also a black belt judo master. Klein was in London, 1949-50, working in an Old Brompton Road frame shop assisting in the preparation of colours, varnish, etc., but no plaque, as yet.

Anrep also provided some mosaic floors at The Tate Gallery, now Tate Britian, post-WW2 bomb damage, see English Buildings.

This section lists the memorials created by the subject on this page:
Boris Anrep

Creations i

Mosaics - emblem

The star is surrounded by an English rose, a Scots thistle, an Irish clover s...

Read More

Mosaics - Queen Elizabeth II

BRITT:OMN:REGINA + ELIZABETH II DEI GRATIA {On a modern label below:} Queen ...

Read More

Mosaics - William and Mary

GVLIELMVS.ET.MARIA.DEI.GRATIA. {On a modern label below:} William III and Ma...

Read More

Other Subjects

Marie Stillman

Marie Stillman

Marie Spartali was born on 13 March 1884 in Hornsey, Middlesex (now Greater London), the eldest of the five children of Michael Demetrius Spartali (1818-1914) and Maria Euphrosyne Spartali née Vars...

Person, Art, Benefactor, Artists' Model, Italy

1 memorial
Ronzo
1 memorial
Sir William Rothenstein

Sir William Rothenstein

Artist. Born at 4 Spring Bank, Bradford, Yorkshire. He studied at the Slade School of Art in London, and at the Académie Julian in Paris, where he met and was encouraged by James McNeill Whistler a...

Person, Art, France

1 memorial
Thomas Hearne

Thomas Hearne

Thomas Hearne was born on 22 September 1744 in Marshfield, Gloucestershire, the son of William and Prudence Hearne. He was baptised on 26 September 1744 in St Mary the Virgin Church, Marshfield. H...

Person, Art, Caribbean Islands

1 memorial
Cyril Mann

Cyril Mann

Painter and sculptor.  Born London but brought up in Nottingham.  Despite a scholarship (aged 12!) to study art at Nottingham Art School he left school and in 1927 went to Canada doing the sort of ...

Person, Art, Sculpture, Canada, France

1 memorial