Thomas Bowman Garvie (6 February 1859 – 5 January 1944) was a Northumbrian artist whose portraits include

Thomas Burt Thomas Burt PC (12 November 1837 – 12 April 1922) was a British trade unionist and one of the first working-class Members of Parliament. Career Burt became secretary of the Northumberland Miners' Association in 1863, then, in 1874, was retu ...

, Lord Percy, Lord Armstrong, George B Bainbridge, Fred B Fenwick and Sir William and Lady Grey. He was a prolific painter of portraits and landscapes. He studied in London and Paris completing the

Grand Tour The Grand Tour was the principally 17th- to early 19th-century custom of a traditional trip through Europe, with Italy as a key destination, undertaken by upper-class young European men of sufficient means and rank (typically accompanied by a tuto ...

in 1898. His work faithfully observed nature: landscapes were painted ''plein air'' and his portraits and figurative paintings reflect a naturalistic use of light and colour. Despite his orthodox outlook, he was at the time an extremely popular portraitist of the North East and there are several of his paintings in the

Laing Art Gallery The Laing Art Gallery in Newcastle upon Tyne, England, is located on New Bridge Street West. The gallery was designed in the Baroque style with Art Nouveau elements by architects Cackett & Burns Dick and is now a Grade II listed building. It ...

, Newcastle and

Cragside Cragside is a Victorian country house near the town of Rothbury in Northumberland, England. It was the home of William Armstrong, 1st Baron Armstrong, founder of the Armstrong Whitworth armaments firm. An industrial magnate, scientist, philanth ...

(National Trust) in Northumberland.

Biography

Bowman Garvie was born in

Morpeth Morpeth may refer to: *Morpeth, New South Wales, Australia ** Electoral district of Morpeth, a former electoral district of the Legislative Assembly in New South Wales * Morpeth, Ontario, Canada * Morpeth, Northumberland, England, UK ** Morpeth (UK ...

Northumberland Northumberland () is a county in Northern England, one of two counties in England which border with Scotland. Notable landmarks in the county include Alnwick Castle, Bamburgh Castle, Hadrian's Wall and Hexham Abbey. It is bordered by land on ...

. He showed an early talent for drawing and was successful in gaining a place to study under

Philip Hermogenes Calderon Philip Hermogenes Calderon ( Poitiers 3 May 1833 – 30 April 1898 London) was an English painter of French birth (mother) and Spanish (father) ancestry who initially worked in the Pre-Raphaelite style before moving towards historical genr ...

in 1883 obtaining there a scholarship for the

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

where he studied until 1888 when he travelled to Paris to study at the

Académie Julian The Académie Julian () was a private art school for painting and sculpture founded in Paris, France, in 1867 by French painter and teacher Rodolphe Julian (1839–1907) that was active from 1868 through 1968. It remained famous for the number a ...

under Fleury and

William-Adolphe Bouguereau William-Adolphe Bouguereau (; 30 November 1825 – 19 August 1905) was a French academic painter. In his realistic genre paintings, he used mythological themes, making modern interpretations of classical subjects, with an emphasis on the female ...

. For the next ten years he spent long periods painting in France, Italy and Switzerland before returning to Morpeth in 1898 to marry his long standing fiancé Isabella Grey. Between 1914 and 1922 he held the position of Master of the Pictures at the Pen and Palette Club in Newcastle; a member of the Cullercoats Art Group; President of the North East Coast Art Club in 1937 and a member of the Art Committee, Kings College, Newcastle.

Legacy

Garvie has over twenty paintings in British public collections.

References

Hall, Marshall, (2005).'' The Artists of Northumbria''. Art Dictionaries Newton, Laura with Booth Gerdts, Abigail, (2003).'' Cullercoats: A North East Colony of Artists''. Sansom and Company {{DEFAULTSORT:Garvie, Thomas Bowman 1859 births 1944 deaths 19th-century English painters English male painters 20th-century English painters People from Morpeth, Northumberland 20th-century English male artists 19th-century English male artists