Portraits of Two Sisters signed Pickersgill 1836

Grafite and watercolour portraits of two young sisters in a Regency interior.

Signed and dated by the artist Pickersgill 1836.

Within a fine, period to the work, gilt gesso frame.

o.s:17.25 in x 19.25 in

Henry William Pickersgill RA. 1782-1875.

Adopted into the Spitalfields silk trade but deciding to make art his career, initially studying under the landscape artist George Arnald before entering the RA Schools in 1805. He established a highly successful practice, dying an extremely wealthy man in Barnes in 1875. He exhibited 384 works at the RA and at the death of Thomas Phillips in 1845 ‚’obtained almost a monopoly of painting the portraits of men and women of eminence in every walk in life’. Amongst his sitters were William Wordsworth, Michael Faraday, George Stephenson, Elizabeth Barrett Browning, Jeremy Bentham and the Duke of Wellington.