Painter, stained glass window designer, mosaicist, teacher, and occasional sculptor, born at Frederiksborg, Denmark. His father, a Danish diplomat, died before he was three and he was brought up by his Scottish-born mother. At 16 Rosenkrantz was sent to Rome to study with the fresco painter Modesto Faustini, moving, after two years, to Paris to study at L’Académie Julian. While in Paris, Rosenkrantz exhibited at the Salon de la Rose + Croix (1892–94), and also in Copenhagen and London. In 1894, he travelled to New York and began working in stained glass; it was here, in the studio of John La Farge, that he executed one of his best-known works in this field, the large east window for St Andrew’s, Wickhambreaux, Kent. In 1898, Rosenkrantz moved to London and in 1901 married his Scottish cousin, Louise Augusta Mackenzie. In London, he established himself as a portrait painter and decorative artist. In 1919, he executed one of his rare works of sculpture, a bronze statue of Christ for the war memorial of St George’s Church, Camberwell (unveiled and dedicated 19 September 1920). In 1939, he and his wife travelled to Denmark to prepare for an exhibition to mark his 70th birthday, their return to England subsequently blocked by the German invasion and occupation of Denmark. The owners of Rosenholm, the old Rosenkrantz family estate in Jutland, invited them to live there. Following the death of his wife in 1944, Rosenkrantz stayed on in Denmark and bequeathed a large number of his paintings to Rosenholm Castle. The Royal Glasgow Institute of Fine Art and the Walker Art Gallery, Liverpool, also have examples.
Original sources include: Email from Bente Arendrup, great-nephew of Arild Rosenkrantz, to the author, 20 February 2003.
Bibliography: A. Borg, War Memorials, London, 1991, p. 101, pl. 131; T. Cavanagh, Public Sculpture of South London, Liverpool, 2007, pp. 231–32, 459; J. Johnson and A. Greutzner, Dictionary of British Artists 1880–1940, Woodbridge, 1976; Arild Rosenkrantz website.
Terry Cavanagh, 2007; revised, July 2024