Ethel Sands

Ethel Sands (6 July 1873 – 19 March 1962) was an American-born artist and hostess who lived in England from childhood. She studied art in Paris, where she met her life partner Anna Hope Hudson. Her works were generally still lifes and interiors, often of Château d'Auppegard that she shared with Hudson. Sands was a Fitzroy Street Group and London Group member. Her works are in London's National Portrait Gallery and other public collections. In 1916, she became a naturalised British citizen. Although a major art patron and an artist, she is most remembered as a hostess for the cultural elite, including Henry James, Virginia Woolf, Roger Fry and Augustus John.

Early life John Singer Sargent, Mrs. Mahlon Day Sands (Mary Hartpence), 1893–1894 Ethel Sands was born on 6 July 1873 in Newport, Rhode Island, the first child of Mary Morton (Hartpence) and Mahlon Day Sands, but it is Hartpence, the daughter of Alanson Hartpence and Mary Morton Hartpence. |group="nb" who married in 1872. |group="nb" Mahlon Sands was secretary of the American Free Trade League, who in 1870 advocated for civil service reform and free trade. He was partner of his deceased father's pharmaceutical importing firm, A.B. Sands and Company. However, Mahlon Sands and his family stayed in England and travelled among European countries. They also visited the United States annually and were there for an extended visit from 1877 to 1879. |group="nb"

John Singer Sargent painted the portrait of her mother, who was considered "a famous society beauty of her day." Her father had ridden horseback through Hyde Park, was thrown from the horse and died an accidental death in 1888. His widow, Mary Sands, raised Ethel and her brothers until her death on 28 July 1896. Sands studied painting in Paris at the Académie Carrière under Eugène Carrière for several years, beginning in 1894. There she met fellow student Nan Hudson, born Anna Hope Hudson in the United States, who became her life partner. According to author Kate Deepwell, her works, and those of Vanessa Bell and other women, were evaluated differently at that time from those made by men: The best critique of woman's work at the time would be that they had individuality, but they would not have been considered innovative, modern works like those made by men.

In Paris in 1911 she had her first show dedicated to her works. Hudson and Sands had a show at Carfax Gallery in 1912. The next year she was part of the "English Post-Impressionists, Cubists and Others" show in Brighton. Her works were exhibited at Goupil Gallery, and in 1922 she had her initial solo show. She also exhibited often at the Women's International Art Club and the New English Art Club. Government Art Collection, and Fitzwilliam Museum.

Socialite and patron Like Lady Sibyl Colefax and Lady Ottoline Morrell, Sands entertained artists and writers with the intention to nurture and discuss ideas relevant to their careers. Lady Ottoline Morrell "took over" Sand's Chelsea house for entertainment after she had to give up her London house at Bedford Square. Affiliated with the Bloomsbury Group, she was best-known as "one of the leading artist hostesses of her time", her lavish affairs were financially possible due to the significant wealth she inherited from her parents. She was mainly at the Oxford, Newington house until 1920, and her uncle, Edwin Lawrence Godkin wrote of his upcoming visit to Sands' house in Oxfordshire, "There one fortnight, and then back to "holy wars", patriotism, and buncombe..."

She was a patron and collector of works by other contemporary artists. For instance, she commissioned Boris Anrep, a Russian immigrant, to create mosaics and murals in her Vale, Chelsea house.

World wars Sands tended to soldiers who had been injured in France during World War I, having established a hospital for soldiers near Dieppe with Hudson. It was forced to close down, and they continued their nursing efforts in both France and England.

Works Among the works that survived World War II plunders and bombings are:

A Dressing Room, oil on millboard, 46 x 38 cm, The Ashmolean Museum of Art and Archaeology. Before it came to The Ashmolean, it was owned by Logan Pearsall Smith. The museum commented on the similarity of this work to paintings made by Édouard Vuillard. A Spare Room, Château d'Auppegard, c. 1925, oil on board, 44.5 x 53.5 cm, Government Art Collection It was exhibited at British Council, Cairo & Algiers, 1944. Auppegard Church from the Château, France, oil on canvas, 60 x 48 cm, City of London Corporation Bedroom Interior, Auppegard, France, oil on canvas, 60 x 48 cm, City of London Corporation Double Doors, Auppegard, France, oil on canvas, 53 x 45 cm, City of London Corporation Figure Seated by an Open Window, oil on canvas, 60 x 48 cm, City of London Corporation Flowers in a Jug, 1920s, oil on canvas, Tate Girl Reading on a Sofa, Auppegard, France, oil on canvas, 53 x 46 cm, City of London Corporation Girl Sewing, Auppegard, France, oil on canvas, 49 x 60 cm, City of London Corporation Interior at Portland Place, London, oil on canvas, 43 x 58 cm, City of London Corporation Interior with Mirror and Fireplace, oil on canvas, 65 x 53 cm, City of London Corporation Interior with Still Life and the Statuette of the Madonna, oil on canvas, 67.3 x 58.5 cm, Amgueddfa Cymru – National Museum Wales (Lloyd) Logan Pearsall Smith, 1932, oil on canvas, 61.4 x 49.8 cm, National Portrait Gallery, London Nan Hudson Playing Patience at Auppegard, France, oil on canvas, 64 x 52 cm, City of London Corporation Still Life with a View over a Cemetery, oil on board, 45 x 37.5 cm, The Fitzwilliam Museum Still Life with Books and Flowers, oil on canvas, 36 x 44 cm, City of London Corporation Tea with Sickert, c. 1911–12, oil on canvas, 61 x 51 cm, Tate The Bedroom at Auppegard, France, Girl Reading, oil on canvas, 51 x 61 cm, City of London Corporation The Chintz Couch, c. 1911–12, oil on board, 46.5 x 38.5 cm, Tate The Open Door, Auppegard, France, oil on canvas, 54 x 45 cm, City of London Corporation