SOCIETY OF PAINTERS IN TEMPERA
The Society of Painters in Tempera was founded in 1901 by Christiana Herringham (1852–1929) and a group of British painters who were interested in reviving the art of tempera painting and its first exhibition was at the Carfax Gallery, Bury Street, in the heart of London's St James'. Lady Herringham, an influential figure in the Edwardian art world, who was an expert on tempera and translator of Cennino Cennini's 'Il Libro dell' Arte' (1899) the textbook of the movement. The artist John Dickson Batten (1860–1932) was the Society's principal organiser and its Honorary Secretary. There were some fifty artist-members of the Society in its brief heyday until the time of the First World War and three tempera exhibitions were held. Founder members included Joseph Edward Southall, Robert Bateman, Holman Hunt, George Frederic Watts, Walter Crane, Mary Sargant-Florence and J. D. Batten and other exhibiting artists included Roger Fry, Edwin Austin Abbey, Maxwell Armfield and Robert Anning Bell. The Society, which was also referred to as the Society of Mural Decorators and Painters in Tempera, published several papers on the subject of tempera painting. An exhibition of the members' work was held at Whitechapel Art Gallery in 1930. After going into decline, the Society was revived in 1997 as the Society of Tempera Painters and is now established both in the United States of America and the United Kingdom.