Later Victorian Portraits Catalogue

Painter; born 18 December 1835 in Taganrog, southwest Russia, son of the British consul to the region. Studied in London from 1848, with George Scharf and James Sherwood Westmacott, then in Florence and Rome and again in London from 1859; attended the life classes of John Phillip in Campden Hill with artists including Frederic Leighton, William Holman Hunt, Augustus Leopold Egg and William Mulready; founder member of the St John’s Wood Clique; married Anne, sister of David Wilkie Wynfield, 1865; exh. Royal Academy 1859–1903; elected ARA 1866, RA 1878, that year exhibiting his most famous picture And when did you last see your father? (Liverpool M.); see also Amy Robsart (RA 1877; Tate); participated in the Dudley Gallery exhibitions with other members of the Clique from 1865; public works include decorative designs for the South Kensington Museum and Royal Albert Hall (Architecture section); later posts included librarian at the RA (to which he bequeathed 72 prints from Wynfield’s photographic series), curator of the Painted Hall at the Royal Naval Hospital, Greenwich and examiner for the National Art Training School; died 3 May 1918 in Teignmouth, Devon.

Yeames is described as ‘much-liked by his colleagues’ at the RA and was a conscientious teacher there. [1]

Magdalene Keaney

Referencesback to top

Cooper 1876–83
Cooper, T., Men of Mark: A Gallery of Contemporary Portraits of Men Distinguished in the Senate, the Church, in Science, Literature and Art, the Army, Navy, Law, Medicine, etc. Photographed from life by Lock and Whitfield, London, 7 ser., 1876–83.

Cruise 2004
Cruise, C., ‘William Frederick Yeames (1835–1918)’, ODNB, Oxford, 2004; online ed., October 2007.

Gould 2004
Gould, V.F., G.F. Watts: The Last Great Victorian, London, 2004.

Hacking 1998
Hacking, J.L., ‘Photography Personified: Art and Identity in British Photography 1857–1869’, unpublished doctoral thesis, Courtauld Institute, University of London, 1998.

Hacking 2000
Hacking, J., Princes of Victorian Bohemia: Photographs by David Wilkie Wynfield, exh. cat., NPG, London, 2000.

Jones et al. 1996
Jones, S., and others, Frederic Leighton 1830–1896, exh. cat., Royal Academy, London, 1996.

McMaster 2008
McMaster, J., ‘That Mighty Art of Black-and-White: Linley Sambourne, Punch and the Royal Academy’, British Art Journal, Autumn 2008, pp.62–76.

McMaster 2009
McMaster, J., That Mighty Art of Black-and-White: Linley Sambourne, Punch and the Royal Academy, Edmonton, Canada, 2009.

Marks 1894
Marks, H.S., Pen & Pencil Sketches, 2 vols, London, 1894.

Morris & Milner 1992
Morris, E., and F. Milner, ‘And When Did You Last See Your Father?’, exh. cat., Walker Art Gallery, Liverpool, 1992.

Ormond 2010
Ormond, L., Linley Sambourne: Illustrator and Punch Cartoonist, London, 2010.

Ormond & Ormond 1975
Ormond, L., and R. Ormond, Lord Leighton, London, 1975.

Robinson [1892]
Robinson, R.W., Members and Associates of the Royal Academy of Arts, 1891. Photographed in their Studios by Ralph W. Robinson of Redhill, n.p., [1892].

Smith 1927
Smith, M.H.S Art and Anecdote: Recollections of William Frederick Yeames R.A, His Life and His Friends, London, 1927.

Stephens 1884
Stephens, F.G., ed., Artists at Home. Photographed by J.P. Mayall and reproduced in facsimile…, 6 parts, London, 1884

Swanson 1977
Swanson, V.G., Sir Lawrence Alma-Tadema: Painter of the Victorian Vision of the Ancient World, London, 1977.

Walkley 1994
Walkley, G., Artists’ Houses in London 1764–1914, Aldershot, 1994.

Wood 1984
Wood, C., intro., A Fraternity of Artists: A Set of Sixty-two Portraits of Late Victorian Artists, by Walker Hodgson, exh. leaflet, Christopher Wood Gallery, London, 1984.