Self Portrait

Artist Myles Birket Foster (North Shields, England, 1825 - 1899)

Date1883

Mediumoil on canvas

ClassificationsPaintings And Drawings

DimensionsOverall: Height: 34.5 cm, Width: 29.7 cm
Frame: Height: 113.5 cm, Width: 67.3 cm

AcquisitionAlexander Macdonald Bequest, 1901.

CopyrightOut of copyright - CC0

LocationView by Appointment - Aberdeen Treasure Hub

Object numberABDAG002599

Keywords

About MeMiles Birket Foster was raised in London and apprenticed to a wood engraver. During the 1840s he worked as an illustrator for periodicals such as 'Punch' and the 'Illustrated London News', but after a tour of the Rhineland in 1852-53 he taught himself to paint in watercolors and launched a hugely popular painting career. Specialising in watercolours, along with William Henry Hunt, he came to epitomize the meticulous and sentimental realism of the Victorian era.

Although the Aberdeen collector Alexander Macdonald, who commissioned this portrait, did not own any other works by Foster, he would have known his work , as Foster was a regular exhibitor at the Royal Academy in London. They also had a mutual friend in Sir John Everett Millais and Foster stayed with him in his Scottish retreat at Birnham in Perthshire.
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Foster, raised in London and apprenticed to a wood engraver, worked first as an illustrator, but developed a highly successful watercolour career