Professor Henry Tonks
Born 9 April 1862
Died 8 January 1937
Active: 1887 - 1937
Country of birth and death: England
Artist, teacher
Born in Solihull, Warwickshire. He was the son of Edmund Tonks, a barrister and owner of a large, well-established brass foundry in Birmingham. Henry attended Clifton College and then trained as a doctor. He worked in the medical profession from 1887 until 1892. Meanwhile Tonks studied art in his spare time with Fred Brown at the Westminster School of Art. In 1892 he was appointed assistant professor of fine art at University College, London (with Philip Wilson Steer). Between 1918-30 Tonks was Slade Professor of Fine Art.
Wealth at death: £17,005 0s. 3d.
Probate date: 10 April 1937
Locations
Address Packwood Grange Solihull Birmingham | View on map
This was the family home and remained so until, at least, 1898 when his father Edmund died.
Studio located at Vale Studios The Vale London SW | View on map
Tonks occupied studio B
Institutional and Business Connections
Adjudicated on a panel at British Artists' Exhibitions
Member of Chelsea Arts Club
1891
Founder member of the Chelsea Arts Club
Principal of Slade School of Fine Art
September 1918 - July 1930
Listed as a Professor from 1918-1919 onwards.
Related to William Tonks & Sons
This firm was partly managed by Henry Tonks' father, Edmund Tonks (c.1825-98).
Teacher at Slade School of Fine Art
September 1893 - 1898
Listed as an assistant.
Personal and Professional Connections
Related to William Henry Tonks Jun.
Henry and William Henry came from branches of a family that owned the firm William Tonks and Sons, brassfounders, in Birmingham.
Sources
Artists and Bohemians: 100 Years with the Chelsea Arts Club
1992
Catalogue of the Exhibition of the Work of Living British Artists
1927
p. 2
Census Returns of England and Wales, 1871
2004
RG10 piece 3191 folio 86 page 9
Oxford Dictionary of National Biography
2004
Lynda Morris, ‘Tonks, Henry (1862–1937)’, Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, 2004 [http://www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/36535, accessed 20 March 2014]
University College London. Calendar. Session 1893-1894
1893
p. 79.
University College London. Calendar. Session 1929-1930
1929
p. 155.
Citing this record
'Professor Henry Tonks', Mapping the Practice and Profession of Sculpture in Britain and Ireland 1851-1951, University of Glasgow History of Art and HATII, online database 2011 [http://sculpture.gla.ac.uk/view/person.php?id=msib4_1251927250, accessed 03 Feb 2023]
