Minnie Dibdin Spooner

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Minnie Dibdin Spooner
A fairy floats behind a young boy working in a flower garden
Illustration from the book, The Golden Staircase
Born
Winifred Dibdin Davison

1867
DiedNovember 1949 (aged 81–82)
OccupationArtist

Minnie Dibdin Spooner (née Davison; 1867 - 6 November 1949) was a British artist and miniature painter. She illustrated children's books under the name M. Dibdin Spooner, and collaborated on stained glass and furniture with her husband, Charles Spooner.

Biography[edit]

Winifred "Minnie" Dibdin Davison was born in 1867.[1][2]

According to the Journal of Stained Glass, she may have studied sometime in the 1890s at the Slade School in London.[2] Between 1893 and 1903, she exhibited at the Royal Academy of London.[3]

In 1900, she married Charles Sydney Spooner, an architect. She collaborated with Charles on furniture and stained glass for various church projects of his, including St. Christopher's in Haslemere and St. Hugh's RC Church in Letchworth.[2][4]

She illustrated the anthology of children's poetry, The Golden Staircase: Poems and Verses for Children, published around 1906. She worked in a Victorian illustration style for the book, which was an ornate style popular for children's literature at the time.[5][6]

Spooner was known as a miniature painter, including under her maiden name. She mainly used oil paint for her portraits, and used watercolour for her miniatures and other subjects.[3] Alongside miniatures and portraits, she also painted landscapes and genre scenes.[7] Her stained glass works were likely influenced by the styles of her friends, Louis Davis and Christopher Whall.[2]

Spooner died on 6 November 1949.[8]

Gallery[edit]

  • A little boy grabs foliage from a tree branch as a little girl watches
    Book illustration from The Golden Staircase (1907)
  • A fairy sleeps on a forest floor. Text below reads "Newts, and blind-worms, do no wrong; come not near our fairy queen"
    Book illustration from The Golden Staircase (1907)
  • An old woman with a Christian clergy hat puts her hand out to a swan
    Book illustration from Our Island Saints (1912)
  • A young person sits on a rock, surrounded by rabbits and birds
    Book illustration from Our Island Saints (1912)
  • An old man in a Christian clergy hat stands with a group of children and touches one of their heads
    Frontispiece from Our Island Saints (1912)

References[edit]

  1. ^ "Object Details". North Hertfordshire Museum. 11 July 2014. Retrieved 3 December 2023.
  2. ^ a b c d Alan Brooks; Peter Cormack (2017). "The Artists of the Glass House". Journal of Stained Glass. 41: 44 – via EBSCO.
  3. ^ a b Foskett, Daphne (1972). A Dictionary of British Miniature Painters. Praeger Publishers. p. 236. Retrieved 3 December 2023.
  4. ^ Gray, Alexander Stuart (1985). Edwardian Architecture: A Biographical Dictionary. Duckworth. p. 335. ISBN 978-0-7156-1012-1. Retrieved 3 December 2023.
  5. ^ Casie Legette (Winter 2022). "Poetry and the Visual Dynamics of Race in the West Indian Readers". Victorian Poetry. 60 (4). West Virginia University Press. Retrieved 3 December 2023.
  6. ^ "The Golden Staircase". The Birmingham Post. 7 December 1906. p. 4. Retrieved 3 December 2023.
  7. ^ Benezit Dictionary Of Artists. Grund. 2006. p. 506. Retrieved 3 December 2023.
  8. ^ "Deaths". The Times. 9 November 1949. Retrieved 3 December 2023 – via Gale Primary Sources.

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