Robert Burford (1791 - 30 January 1861) was an English painter of panoramas.

Life

Burford was born in 1791 and first exhibited at the

Royal Academy The Royal Academy of Arts (RA) is an art institution based in Burlington House in Piccadilly London, England. Founded in 1768, it has a unique position as an independent, privately funded institution led by eminent artists and architects. Its ...

in 1812 with ''A View of Westminster Hall''. In conjunction with fellow artist

Henry Aston Barker Henry Aston Barker (1774 – 19 July 1856) was a Scottish landscape and panorama painter and exhibitor, the son of Robert Barker whose business he continued. Life and works Barker was born in Glasgow, the younger son of Robert Barker, the panor ...

, he opened a panorama on a site later occupied by the Strand Theatre. It was then moved to

Leicester Square Leicester Square ( ) is a pedestrianised town square, square in the West End of London, England, and is the centre of London's entertainment district. It was laid out in 1670 as Leicester Fields, which was named after the recently built Leice ...

, where for many years it formed one of the chief attractions of London. Burford exhibited a succession of panoramas depicting major landmarks across Europe, all of which he personally visited in order to obtain accurate drawings.

John Ruskin John Ruskin (8 February 1819 20 January 1900) was an English polymath a writer, lecturer, art historian, art critic, draughtsman and philanthropist of the Victorian era. He wrote on subjects as varied as art, architecture, Critique of politic ...

visited the exhibition as a boy, and spoke in high praise of Burford's abilities in his autobiography ''Praeterita'' (1885, p200). Burford died at his home, 35 Camden Road Villas, Camden, London, on 30 January 1861, just after finishing a view of

Naples Naples ( ; ; ) is the Regions of Italy, regional capital of Campania and the third-largest city of Italy, after Rome and Milan, with a population of 908,082 within the city's administrative limits as of 2025, while its Metropolitan City of N ...

and

Messina Messina ( , ; ; ; ) is a harbour city and the capital city, capital of the Italian Metropolitan City of Messina. It is the third largest city on the island of Sicily, and the 13th largest city in Italy, with a population of 216,918 inhabitants ...

Works

Amongst the panoramas he exhibited were ''Battle of Waterloo'', ''Cabool'', ''Baden'', ''The Embarkation of the Queen at Treport'', ''Athens'', ''Constantinople'', ''Grand Cairo'', ''Ruins of Pompeii'', ''The Polar Regions'', ''The Battle of the Alma'', ''Siege of Sebastopol'', ''Venice'', ''Rome'' and ''Rio Janeiro''.

References

Attribution: * {{DEFAULTSORT:Burford, Robert 1792 births 1861 deaths English landscape painters