WIRTH-MILLER, Dennis

1915 - 2010

As Denis Wurtmüller, he was born at Folkestone, Kent on 27 November 1915, son of German born Johann Wurtmüller (1878-18 November 1938), a hotelier, and his wife a Miss Ames, who married at Alnwick, Northumberland in 1909, Johann anglicised their surname to Wirth-Miller because of hostility to the family experienced from local people on the South Coast prior to the First World War. After school, Dennis joined Tootal Broadhurst Lee, the textile manufacturers in Manchester, where his innate talent prompted his appointment as a designer. After transferring to London early in 1937, he met illustrator Richard 'Dickie' Wasey Chopping (1917-2008), who moved into Dennis's studio in North London, formerly the studio of painter Walter Sickert (1860-1942). Thus began a lifelong relationship and in December 2005, they became the first in Colchester to make a civil partnership. They met painters Cedric Morris and Arthur Lett-Haines, who had established the East Anglian School of Painting and Drawing, first at Dedham and, when that was destroyed by fire, at Benton End, Hadleigh, Suffolk. In 1939, Wirth-Miller was a commercial artist, living at Daffodil Cottage, Church Road, Lexden, Colchester and exhibited at the Ipswich Art Club in 1942, a 'Landscape in Oils' and, after the war years, his work was in oil on a large scale. His early works were portraits, figures and still life and a series of large dog paintings such as hounds on the move, Mastiffs, Great Danes in motion in the act of turning or hunting or disappearing into the mist. His later works were East Anglian, or Dartmoor landscapes and he exhibited at Leeds Art Gallery; Clare College, Cambridge and in London at Beaux Arts Gallery; Arthur Jeffries Gallery; New Art Centre and had four solo shows at Lefevre Gallery. Denis Wirth-Miller latterly lived at Store House, The Quay, Wivenhoe, Essex and a founder member of the Wivenhoe Arts Club. Denis Wirth-Miller died of vascular dementia in Colchester General Hospital on 27 October 2010. His 'Landscape' was purchased for the Royal Collection in 1953.

Royal Academy Exhibits
from The Store House, The Quay, Wivenhoe, Essex
1979 108 Dartmoor Landscape 1978
109 East Anglian Landscape 1978

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Works by This Artist