William Bruce Ellis Ranken, “The Garden Door”, 1926, Oil on Canvas, 218.4 x 162.6 cm, Glasgow Museum Resource Center

William Bruce Ellis Ranken was a British artist and an Edwardian Aesthete. Born in Edinburgh, Scotland, he attended Eton College and then proceeded to the Slade School of Art in London, studying under British darftsman and painter Henry Tonks. While at the Slade School, Ranken became a life-long friend with actor Ernest Thesiger, whose portrait Ranken painted in 1918.

Ranken first exhibit was at the Carfax Gallery in 1904 where he was well received by fellow artists and art critics. At this time he became friends with the Impressionist painter Wilfrid Gabriel de Glehn and painter John Singer Sargent. Upon traveling to the United States, Ranken recieved commissions for portraits of the wealthy, including the Banderbilts, Havermeyers, and the Witneys, working in oils, pastels and watercolors. Returning to Britain, he painted many portraits fo the aristocracy and the British royal family.

William Bruce Ellis Ranken died suddenly in London in 1941 at the age of sixty. He was buried near Warbrook, at Saint Mary’s Church.

Note: A more extensive biography, with images of his work, can be found in the September 2023 archive of this site.