John House 1945-2012
February 10 2012
Video: Courtauld
It is with great sadness that I report the news of Professor John House's sudden death. He was Emeritus Professor of The Courtauld Institute in London, and one of the most noted art historians of his generation. He specialised in 19th Century French art, and published on books on Monet, Manet, Degas and Renoir.
Not only was he a great scholar, he was also a thoroughly nice man; perpetually cheerful, always happy to help, and blessed with a communicative ease most academics can only dream of. Viewers of Fake or Fortune? will remember him from our programme on Monet, in which he had to return to London from Paris with news of the Wildenstein Institute's rejection of David Joel's painting. In the above clip he can be seen talking with characteristic fluency on Renoir's La Loge.
The Director of the Courtauld, Deborah Swallow, has made this statement:
One of the pre-eminent scholars of nineteenth-century French art of his generation, John served The Courtauld with great distinction from his appointment in 1980 up until his retirement as the Walter H. Annenberg Professor in 2010; I cannot think of anyone with a deeper attachment to all aspects of our community, with which his close and richly productive involvement has now been cruelly cut short.
John was a much loved and greatly respected teacher and colleague. His scholarship reached well beyond the world of academe through the many wonderful exhibitions he curated both here at The Courtauld, at the Royal Academy and throughout the world. It is almost impossible to imagine The Courtauld without his strong yet benign presence near at hand.
