The 19th Century Lady Croft

1800s

Portrait Of A Gentleman & His Estate, 18th Century attributed to Arthur DEVIS (1712-1787) One of a matching pair - the other is believed to be the brother Large 18th century Eng...

Oil on board Image size: 5 1/2 x 4 1/2 inches (14 x 11.5 cm) Original 19th century oval mount and frame Provenance; With Richard Naworth, Blackburn William Edward Frost (September 1810 – 4 June 1877) was an English painter of the Victorian era. Virtually alone among English artists in the middle Victorian period, he devoted his practice to the portrayal of the female nude. Specialising in portraiture from about 1830, Frost painted more than 300 portraits during a 15-year period, and showed some as his first exhibits from 1836. William Edward Frost was born in Wandsworth, then in Surrey, in September 1810. He showed artistic talent from an early age, and was encouraged in this by his father: first by his arranging drawing lessons with a Miss Evatt, a neighbouring amateur, and then, in 1825, by his introducing him to William Etty, who became his mentor. On Etty’s recommendation, he entered Henry Sass’s School for Drawing and Painting at 6 Charlotte Street, in 1826, and spent three years there, while also studying at the British Museum each winter. Frost was educated in the schools of the Royal Academy, beginning in 1829; he established a reputation as a portrait painter before branching into historical and mythological subjects, including the subgenre of fairy painting...