A great English eccentric genius

January 12, 2005

MUNNINGS ROAD

Catch him on a good day and he was an elegant country squire who behaved impeccably, with marvellous courtesy.

Sir Alfred Munnings with one of the horse paintings he was famous for creating.

But if it wasn’t a good day, he could be a foul-mouthed boor, famous for swearing for 10 minutes without repeating himself.

That was Sir Alfred Munnings, a Norwich apprentice who grew up to become one of the truly great East Anglian artists.

And when he died in 1959, his reputation as an English eccentric of the most colourful kind was almost as well known as his work.

At his funeral, Sir Charles Wheeler, president of the Royal Academy, said: “He drank so deeply of the visible world that he became at times quite intoxicated with it and was led into extravagancies which delighted some and exasperated others.”

This man painted horses like none other.

Today you have to be very rich to afford one of his wonderful paintings of a golden age when horsepower ruled.

But who was he?

Alfred Munnings was born at Mendham on the Norfolk/Suffolk border in 1878, the second of four sons of miller John Munnings.

As a child he used to sketch the great horses — a long, patient line of them after harvest — as they waited for the carts of wheat to be unloaded at his father’s mill.

He left Framlingham College at the age of 14. His father paid out £40 so young Alfred could start a six-year apprenticeship at Page Bros, the Norwich firm of printers, lithographers and stationers.

It was there that his artistic talents flourished. He started to produce stunning advertising posters for the likes of Caleys and Colman’s.

And then, after a nine-hour working day, he would cycle to Norwich School of Art for a two-hour lesson.

And when he wasn’t painting, young Munnings enjoyed the many pleasures that Norwich had to offer.

He loved the pubs, the rougher the better, where he was often the life and soul of the tap-room.

In 1899, the year his apprenticeship came to an end, he had two pictures accepted by the Royal Academy — his career, with encouragement from Norwich artists and dealers, was launched.

This straight-talking, no nonsense character was to marry twice. His first wife, Florence, committed suicide. His second, Violet, was an eccentric in her own right.

His fame as a painter — especially of horses — spread across this country and the world.

In 1944, he was elected president of the Royal Academy — turning out to be the most controversial they had ever had — and received a knighthood.
He was also made an honorary freeman of Norwich.

Munnings continued to lecture into old age, instructing that the water bottle on the rostrum was filled with neat gin instead of water.

He died in the summer of 1959 at the age of 80. The value of his paintings continues to soar. The Norwich road named in his honour was built in 1955.

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