Ben Uri Research Unit

Born: 1915 Paris, France

Died: 2005 London, England

Year of Migration to the UK: 1945

Other name/s: Pierre Gimpel

Biography

Art dealer and gallerist Peter Gimpel was born into a Jewish family in Paris, France on 26 October 1915. His older brother, Charles was in the same business, and they came from a strong line of art dealers. The youngest brother, Jean, was in the diamond business. The three brothers enjoyed a privileged childhood in a Bois-de-Boulogne home on the west side of the city, with ample servants and a focus on cultural refinement. Their grandfather, Ernst, was a picture dealer and their father, from an Alsatian Jewish family, René Albert Gimpel (1881-1945) was a distinguished French art dealer and member of the resistance who lost his life towards the end of the war in the Neuengamme concentration camp in Germany, while most of his collection was lost in Paris during the war years. In 1912, René Gimpel had married Florence Duveen, the sister of the Englishman Joseph Duveen, 1st Baron Duveen, considered one of the most influential art dealers in England and the son of a prosperous Dutch-Jewish immigrant.

Peter Gimpel was sent in his adolescent years to Le Rosey, a prestigious boarding school in Rolle, Switzerland, which he detested. With the outbreak of the Second World War, all three Gimpel brothers were conscripted into the French military. Peter served in North Africa as a soldier, alongside his brother Charles, who quickly advanced to become a liaison officer with the 51st Highland Division, and participated actively in the German offensive. Both siblings were later evacuated through Dunkirk in 1940. Peter received a commission with the 60th Rifles, was engaged from the outset in the Battle of El Alamein, endured the Italian campaign at Monte Cassino, and concluded his military duties in a small unit located 100 miles within Germany. Peter immigrated to London after the war in 1945 or 1946.

In November 1946, Peter and Charles Gimpel co-founded the London art gallery Gimpel Fils, named to honour their late father. The first location was in South Molton Street, London W1, but it was soon relocated to significantly larger premises in nearby Davies Street. Its inaugural exhibition was entitled Five Centuries of French Painting and included parts of René Gimpel’s collection that survived the turmoil before the Second World War. Throughout the 1940s and 1950s, the gallery earned a reputation for promoting the avant-garde and quickly rose to prominence by representing significant artists from both the UK and abroad. In the 1950s and 1960s, Gimpel Fils was instrumental in promoting contemporary British artists, particularly those associated with the St Ives school, as well as abstract painters from the Ecole de Paris and, to a lesser extent, emerging American artists, thereby enhancing their global stature. The gallery managed several major artists, including Barbara Hepworth and Ben Nicholson, the latter who moved to Gimpel Fils from the Lefevre Gallery, remaining until the early 1960s. The gallery's commitment extended beyond London: in 1962, they brothers partnered with fellow émigré dealer, Erica Brausen to open the Gimpel und Hanover Galerie in Zurich,, Switzerland and with Max Weitzenhoffer in 1969 to establish Gimpel & Weitzenhoffer in New York, USA. The gallery supported its artists in various ways, including organising large-scale sculpture shows in Syon Park outside London and assisting sculptors like Hepworth, Lynn Chadwick, and Kenneth Armitage in transitioning to the costly medium of bronze. Through these efforts, Gimpel Fils has maintained a unique position of influence and commitment in the art world, continually nurturing and expanding the international audience for their artists. The Gimpel family has also kept a strong hand in the gallery’s operations, with René Gimpel, a fourth-generation art dealer and son of Charles, serving as co-director into the 21st century.

Peter Gimpel was an keen sailor, regularly racing a Dragon at the Royal Corinthian Yacht Club in Burnham-on-Crouch, Essex, which he joined in 1936, later becoming commodore. He also co-owned a cruiser docked at Antibes, France with which he navigated the Mediterranean and Aegean seas into his late eighties. His social circle primarily comprised fellow sailors rather than artists. Peter Gimpel remained unmarried, spending many years with his mother in a large flat in Knightsbridge, London and later in an apartment in Wapping, close to the river. Peter Gimpel died in London, England on 6 December 2005. In the UK public domain, photographs of Peter and Charles Gimpel by the Russian-Armenian émigré photographer Ida Kar are held in the collection of the National Portrait Gallery. Gimpel Fils is listed in the Digital Benin—a website that researchers, among other issues, the destiny and sales of the Benin bronzes looted in the now infamous Benin Expedition of 1897 by the British forces. Peter Gimpel featured in Ben Uri's summer 2024 exhibition, Cosmopolis: The Impact of Refugee Art Dealers in London.

Related books

Cherith Summers, ‘Gimpel Fils’, in Monica Bohm-Duchen, ed., Brave New Visions: The Émigrés who Transformed the British Art World, exh. cat. (London: Sotheby's, 2019), pp. 16-17
Cherith Summers, Erica Brausen & The Hanover Gallery (1948-1973), (MA Thesis: St. Andrews University, 2018), p.14
Alice Correia, ‘Gimpel Fils, Barbara Hepworth and the promotion of British sculpture in the 1950s’, Sculpture Journal, Vol. 24, No. 1, pp. 2015, pp. 97-112
Diana J. Kostyrko, 'René Gimpel's Diary of an Art Dealer ', The Burlington Magazine, No. 1350, Vol. 157, 2015, pp. 615-619
Colin Gleadell, ‘SALESROOMS: London-Spain and Spin', Art Monthly (Archive: 1976-2005), No. 236, 2000, p. 60
Margit Weinberg-Staber, Josef Albers: Homage to the Square, exh. cat. (Zurich/London: Die Galerie/Gimpel Fils, 1965)

Public collections

National Portrait Gallery

Related organisations

Gimpel Fils (co-founder )

Selected exhibitions

Cosmopolis: The Impact of Refugee Art Dealers in London, Ben Uri Gallery and Museum (2024)
Barbara Hepworth: 1903-1975 (50 Sculptures from 1935 to 1970), Gimpel Fils, London (1975)
Germaine Richier, 1904-1959: Retrospective, Gimpel Fils, London (1973)
Isamu Noguchi, Gimpel Fils, London (1972)
Who Are You: The Human Form in Primitive and Modern Art, Gimpel Fils, London (1972)
Pre-Columbian Gold and Silver, Gimpel Fils, London (1969)
Kupka: Gouaches 1904-1945, Gimpel Fils, London (1964)
A Decade with Ben Nicolson, Gimpel Fils, London (1963)
Matta, Gimpel Fils, London (1961)
Karel Appel, Gimpel Fils, London (1959)
Five Centuries of French Painting, Gimpel Fils, London (1946)

Ben Uri archive

Consult items in the Ben Uri archive related to [Peter Gimpel]