Page 159 illustration in English Fairy Tales

John Dickson Batten (8 October 1860 – 5 August 1932), born in Plymouth, Devon, was an English painter of figures in

oils An oil is any nonpolar chemical substance that is composed primarily of hydrocarbons and is hydrophobic (does not mix with water) & lipophilic (mixes with other oils). Oils are usually flammable and surface active. Most oils are unsaturate ...

tempera Tempera (), also known as egg tempera, is a permanent, fast-drying painting medium consisting of colored pigments mixed with a water-soluble binder medium, usually glutinous material such as egg yolk. Tempera also refers to the paintings done ...

and fresco and a book illustrator and printmaker. He was an active member of the Society of Painters in Tempera, with his wife Mary Batten, a gilder.

Career

As a student at the

Slade School of Fine Arts The UCL Slade School of Fine Art (informally The Slade) is the art school of University College London (UCL) and is based in London, England. It has been ranked as the UK's top art and design educational institution. The school is organised as ...

under Alphonse Legros he exhibited until 1887 at the

Grosvenor Gallery The Grosvenor Gallery was an art gallery in London founded in 1877 by Sir Coutts Lindsay and his wife Blanche. Its first directors were J. Comyns Carr and Charles Hallé. The gallery proved crucial to the Aesthetic Movement because it prov ...

with Sir

Edward Burne-Jones Sir Edward Coley Burne-Jones, 1st Baronet, (; 28 August, 183317 June, 1898) was a British painter and designer associated with the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood which included Dante Gabriel Rossetti, John Millais, Ford Madox Brown and Holman ...

. He indulged in mythological and allegorical themes.
Among Batten's paintings are ''The Garden of Adonis: Amoretta and Time'', ''The Family'', ''Mother and Child'', ''Sleeping Beauty: The Princess Pricks Her Finger'', ''Snow White and the Seven Dwarves'', and ''Atalanta and Melanion''. In the 1890s Batten illustrated a series of fairy tale collections edited by

Joseph Jacobs Joseph Jacobs (29 August 1854 – 30 January 1916) was an Australian folklorist, translator, literary critic, social scientist, historian and writer of English literature who became a notable collector and publisher of English folklore. Jacobs ...

, who was a member of the

Folklore Society The Folklore Society (FLS) is a national association in the United Kingdom for the study of folklore. It was founded in London in 1878 to study traditional vernacular culture, including traditional music, song, dance and drama, narrative, arts an ...

(and editor of its journal 1890–93): at least ''English Fairy Tales'', ''Celtic Fairy Tales'', ''Indian Fairy Tales'', ''More English Fairy Tales'', and ''More Celtic Fairy Tales'' from 1890 to 1895 and ''Europa's Fairy Book'' (1916). (The latter has also been issued as ''European Folk and Fairy Tales''.) He also illustrated English versions of '' Tales from the Arabian Nights'' and ''

Dante's Inferno ''Inferno'' (; Italian for "Hell") is the first part of Italian writer Dante Alighieri's 14th-century epic poem ''Divine Comedy''. It is followed by ''Purgatorio'' and '' Paradiso''. The ''Inferno'' describes Dante's journey through Hell, gui ...

''. Batten also wrote two books of poetry and a book on animal and human flight. John d batten 1892 23

At the end of the 1890s he turned to the painting technique of

egg tempera Tempera (), also known as egg tempera, is a permanent, fast-drying painting medium consisting of colored pigments mixed with a water-soluble binder medium, usually glutinous material such as egg yolk. Tempera also refers to the paintings done ...

and played an important part in its revival with Birmingham artists such as Arthur Gaskin. His ''Pandora'' in this medium was exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1913 and presented to

Reading University The University of Reading is a public university in Reading, Berkshire, England. It was founded in 1892 as University College, Reading, a University of Oxford extension college. The institution received the power to grant its own degrees in 192 ...

in 1918, where it has now been restored.“Pandora by J.D. Batten”
Reading University Batten also served as a Secretary to the Society of Painters in Tempera and published in 1922 an article on ''The Practice of Tempera Painting''.

Gallery

File:Illustration at page 42 in Europa's Fairy Book.png, Illustration of ''Europa's Fairy Book'', 1916 File:Design in front matter of More English Fairy Tales (1892).png, Design in front matter of ''More English Fairy Tales'', 1894. File:Design in front matter of Indian Fairy Tales (1892).png, Design in front matter of ''Indian Fairy Tales'', 1892. File:Page 4 illustration in English Fairy Tales.png, Illustration by Batten for ''English Fairy Tales'', 1892 : How to get into my book File:Design in front matter of More Celtic Fairy Tales (1892).png, Design in front matter of ''More Celtic Fairy Tales'', 1895. File:Celtic Fairy Tales-1892-048-1.jpg, Illustration for an Irish legend in ''Celtic Fairy Tales'', 1892. File:Celtic Fairy Tales-1892-0023.jpg, Connla and the Fairy Maiden (from ''Celtic Fairy Tales'', by Joseph Jacobs) 1892 File:Nswag, john dickson batten, biancaneve e i sette nani, 1897.JPG, Biancaneve e i sette nani (Snow White and the Seven Dwarves) 1897

References

Sources

Alan Windsor. (1998) ''Handbook of Modern British Painting and Printmaking, 1900–1990''. Ashgate Publishing, 2nd ed. .

External links

* * * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Batten, John Dickson 1860 births 1932 deaths 19th-century English painters English male painters 20th-century English painters English illustrators English children's book illustrators 19th-century illustrators of fairy tales 20th-century illustrators of fairy tales Artists from Plymouth, Devon 20th-century English male artists 19th-century English male artists