John, Gwen(dolen) Mary (1876-1939), British painter. She led a reclusive life (unlike her flamboyant brother, Augustus John) and made little impact on the art world of her time. However, since her death her reputation has grown enormously and she is now regarded as one of the most sensitive and distinctive British artists of her generation.

Gwen was born in Haverfordwest, Pembrokeshire, the daughter of a solicitor. From 1895 to 1898 she studied at the Slade School of Fine Art, London. Her brother Augustus was 18 months her junior, but he had begun training at the Slade a year before her. After leaving the Slade, she continued her studies for a few months in Paris under the American painter James McNeill Whistler, whose remarkable feeling for muted tones greatly influenced her work.

In 1899 Gwen returned to England, but from 1904 she lived in France, initially in Paris, then from 1911 at Meudon, a suburb of the capital. She also often visited Brittany, whose rugged coast reminded her of her native Pembrokeshire. Although she could be painfully shy, she also formed passionate attachments to certain people, most notably the great sculptor Auguste Rodin. She met him in 1904 through working as his model (she earned a meagre living in this way), and in spite of the 36-year gap in their ages they became lovers for several years.

Rodin encouraged her in her work, and another important figure in this respect was the American lawyer and art collector John Quinn. Gwen’s output was small and she was generally reluctant to part with her paintings, but through an agent in Paris Quinn bought a number of them between 1910 and his death in 1924. Her pictures consist mainly of portraits, views of sparsely furnished interiors, and still-lifes. The portraits include several of herself, examples of which are in the collections of the National Portrait Gallery and the Tate, London, both dating from about 1900. She also did several of nuns, for example A Young Nun (1915, National Galleries of Scotland collection) and Mere Poussepin (1918-1921, Barber Institute of Fine Art, Birmingham). (Gwen was to convert to Catholicism in 1913 and became very devout.) Typically the mood of her work is introspective and her handling of paint is soft and subtle, but her pictures nevertheless have strength and dignity. In addition to oils she produced watercolours and drawings.

Gwen’s work was sometimes seen in mixed exhibitions in London and Paris, and also in New York, notably at the Armory Show in 1913. However, during her lifetime she had only one solo show, at the New Chenil Galleries, London, in 1926. This was fairly well received, but in her later years she lived almost like a hermit and virtually stopped working, and when she died in Dieppe, Brittany, in 1939 she was hardly known outside a small circle of friends and patrons. In 1946, however, Augustus stated that, “Fifty years from now I shall be known as the brother of Gwen John”, and this bold prediction has been partially fulfilled: his once great reputation was badly fading by the time of his death in 1961, whereas hers has grown vastly since about the same time.

Although Augustus’s reputation has subsequently revived, Gwen is now regarded by many critics as the greater artist. An opportunity to compare their work was provided by a major joint exhibition at Tate Britain in 2004. Their art was as different as their personalities: his paintings are colourful and vibrant, although their brilliance tended to degenerate into mere flashiness; hers are modest in size and subject, but they often have a haunting sense of inner life. Augustus said that Gwen’s works are “almost painfully charged with feeling”, whereas his own were “painfully empty of it”.