Louis Welden Hawkins

Louis Welden Hawkins ( born July 1, 1849 in Stuttgart and Esslingen; † May 1, 1910 in Paris) was a French painter of symbolism British- Austrian origin.

The son of a British naval officer and Louise Sopransi, Baroness von Welden, an Austrian woman and daughter of a field marshal should pursue a military career, actually. But in 1873 he broke with his family, went to Paris and attended the Académie Julian in Paris. In 1881 he was allowed for the first time exhibit at the Salon of the Société des Artistes Français. He chose first the stylistic way of symbolism, in his later years he worked more as a landscape painter, mainly in Brittany and lived in poverty. In the Salon of the Société Nationale des Beaux-Arts, he was represented from 1894 to 1911. New friends he was with writers like Jean Lorrain, Paul Adam, Laurent Tailhade, Robert de Montesquiou and Stéphane Mallarmé but also with trade unionists and socialist politicians.