Florence, Lady Phillips

Lady Florence Phillips ( born June 14, 1863 in Cape Town, † August 23, 1940 at Vergelegen near Somerset West) was a South African high society lady, philanthropist and patron of the arts.

Life

Dorothea Sarah Florence Alexandra Ortlepp was the only daughter of the geologist and naturalist Albert Frederick Ortlepp and his wife Sarah Walker. Your school education she got at the Academy Rondebosch in Cape Town and later in Bloemfontein. In 1885 Florence married in Cape Town Ortlepp the rich diamond mine owner and politician Sir Lionel Phillips ( 1855-1936 ). From the marriage, which by all accounts was happy, went forth two sons and a daughter.

During the Second Boer War, the family lived in London and at their country seat Tylney Hall in Hampshire. During this time, Lady Phillips showed keen interest in contemporary art and acquired a number of works, including William Orpen, William Rothenstein, Walter Sickert, Camille Pissarro, Paul Cézanne, Pierre- Auguste Renoir, Paul Signac, Georges Seurat, Claude Monet and Alfred Sisley. Back in South Africa founded Lady Phillips with Sir Maximilian Michaelis and Sir Hugh Lane 's first public Gallery of Modern Art in Johannesburg, later Johannesburg Art Gallery, as well as an art school at the University of Cape Town.

Florence, Lady Phillips died on their remote estate Vergelegen and was buried beside her husband in the Brixton Cemetery, Johannesburg.

Gallery

Sir William Nicholson: Portrait of Lady Phillips, oil on canvas, 1910