Raoul Millais


Hesketh Raoul Lejarderay Millais, usually known as Raoul or 'Liony' Millais, was a portrait painter, equestrian artist and sportsman.

Family background

Millais was the grandson of the Pre-Raphaelite painter Sir John Everett Millais and the son of naturalist John Guille Millais, from whom he inherited both his artistic talent and his love of animals and of hunting.

Artistic career

Millais is best known for his equestrian paintings and for his Spanish work, created when he accompanied Ernest Hemingway. Like his contemporary, Alfred Munnings, Millais was an opponent of Modernism in art, which he called "the Picasso lark".
Numerous painted works by Millais have been sold at auction at Christie's, and Bonhams in London. His oeuvre has been posthumously profiled in publications such as Artnet, The Independent, The Field, and Art UK.

Personal life

He married Elinor Clare Macdonell, daughter of railroad magnate Allan Ronald Macdonell and Margaret Helen Ryan, of Montreal, Canada. Millais and Elinor had two sons, John Millais and Hugh Geoffroy Millais who became a celebrated actor.
After Elinor's death in 1953, Millais married his second wife Kay Prior Palmer with whom he had a third son, Hesketh Merlin.
He died in 1999 aged 98 in Oxfordshire, England.

Biography