The British painter Thomas Webster, born on 10 March 1800 in London, has pursued the so-called genre art or genre painting to perfection. The style associated with everyday life is at the same time linked to the everyday scenes of often bourgeois society, which are depicted in their working, living and leisure environments. In this context, this art approaches the portrait without wanting to concretize the identity of the persons portrayed. In addition to landscape painting, this style of art was also oriented towards Romanticism, which always tried to express something uncanny, longing or love itself in its motifs. In this context, not only painters such as Thomas Cole and Joseph Mallord William Turner play a major role, but also the writers and poets Mary Shelley, Lord Byron and others. The transition between the two art movements is thus fluid, and the genre painter Thomas Webster is a representative of it.
The word genre, which can be translated in Latin as "genus" for species and gender, can also be described as an image of morality, although this is outdated nowadays. Thomas Webster, who became interested in art at a very early age, was first a music student and chorister at St. Georges Chapel in Windsor Castle before switching to painting. As a highly talented student he won his first art prize in his second semester and inspired artists such as George Bernard O'Neill and Frederick Daniel Hardy in his later creative years. With both artists he was rather connected by an intimate friendship. He met the artists mentioned above at the Cranbrook Artists' Colony in Kent and lived there until his death on 23 September 1886. As a member of the Royal Academy, his paintings were always represented in high-calibre exhibitions and were published in numerous prints, engravings and literary volumes. His work is very diverse and often based on children's scenes.
Thomas Webster's works of art, whether lithographically, engraved or in the form of an oil painting on various backgrounds, are dark, thoughtful, cheerful and humorous in their subject matter. While in some pictures the romantic leanings are recognizable (Ring O Roses, Reading the News), in other pictures the simple and family-friendly life is emphasized (Sickness and Health). Often moral or allegorical contents are used, which are inherent in genre painting. Even the reference to fairy-tale content (On her grandmother's bed) refers to the world-famous story of Little Red Riding Hood, thus interweaving dream and reality. The colours, sometimes dull and then saturated again, also change the moods in Webster's paintings, who is a master of both dark backgrounds and daylight. What remains are numerous pictures, which are able to consistently convey almost every imaginable everyday scene.
The British painter Thomas Webster, born on 10 March 1800 in London, has pursued the so-called genre art or genre painting to perfection. The style associated with everyday life is at the same time linked to the everyday scenes of often bourgeois society, which are depicted in their working, living and leisure environments. In this context, this art approaches the portrait without wanting to concretize the identity of the persons portrayed. In addition to landscape painting, this style of art was also oriented towards Romanticism, which always tried to express something uncanny, longing or love itself in its motifs. In this context, not only painters such as Thomas Cole and Joseph Mallord William Turner play a major role, but also the writers and poets Mary Shelley, Lord Byron and others. The transition between the two art movements is thus fluid, and the genre painter Thomas Webster is a representative of it.
The word genre, which can be translated in Latin as "genus" for species and gender, can also be described as an image of morality, although this is outdated nowadays. Thomas Webster, who became interested in art at a very early age, was first a music student and chorister at St. Georges Chapel in Windsor Castle before switching to painting. As a highly talented student he won his first art prize in his second semester and inspired artists such as George Bernard O'Neill and Frederick Daniel Hardy in his later creative years. With both artists he was rather connected by an intimate friendship. He met the artists mentioned above at the Cranbrook Artists' Colony in Kent and lived there until his death on 23 September 1886. As a member of the Royal Academy, his paintings were always represented in high-calibre exhibitions and were published in numerous prints, engravings and literary volumes. His work is very diverse and often based on children's scenes.
Thomas Webster's works of art, whether lithographically, engraved or in the form of an oil painting on various backgrounds, are dark, thoughtful, cheerful and humorous in their subject matter. While in some pictures the romantic leanings are recognizable (Ring O Roses, Reading the News), in other pictures the simple and family-friendly life is emphasized (Sickness and Health). Often moral or allegorical contents are used, which are inherent in genre painting. Even the reference to fairy-tale content (On her grandmother's bed) refers to the world-famous story of Little Red Riding Hood, thus interweaving dream and reality. The colours, sometimes dull and then saturated again, also change the moods in Webster's paintings, who is a master of both dark backgrounds and daylight. What remains are numerous pictures, which are able to consistently convey almost every imaginable everyday scene.
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