Abraham Cooper

Early Victorian Portraits Catalogue Entry

Sitter in 9 portraits
Artist associated with 1 portrait
Showed an aptitude for drawing from an early age. When he was twenty-two, wishing to possess a portrait of a favourite horse under his care, he bought a manual of painting. His employer bought the resulting work and encouraged him to continue. Cooper was introduced to Benjamin Marshall, the animal painter, who took him into his studio. From 1811 he was a regular contributor to the illustrated periodical Sporting Magazine and soon after began exhibiting paintings at the Royal Academy and the British Institution. Initially his subjects were animals; he later started making meticulously researched battle paintings, often of the civil war, and acknowledged as the country's principal battle painter.