John William Godward
John William Godward was an English painter from the end of the
Pre-Raphaelite / Neo-Classicist era. He was a protégé
of Sir Lawrence Alma-Tadema but his style of painting fell out of
favour with the arrival of painters like Picasso. He committed suicide
at the age of 61 and is said to have written in his suicide note
that "the world was not big enough" for him and a Picasso.
His already estranged family, who had disapproved of him becoming
an artist, were ashamed of his suicide and burned his papers. No
photographs of Godward are known to survive.
Godward was born in 1861 and lived in Wilton Grove, Wimbledon.
He exhibited at the Royal Academy from 1887. When he moved to Italy
with one of his models in 1912, his family broke off all contact
with him and even cut his image from family pictures. Godward returned
to England in 1919, died in 1922 and is buried in Brompton Cemetery,
west London.
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