Charles Holroyd

Sir Charles Holroyd RE (9 April 1861 – 17 November 1917) was an English painter, original printmaker and curator during the late Victorian and Edwardian eras up to and including the First World War.

[2] After passing six months at Newlyn, where he painted his first picture exhibited in the Royal Academy, Fishermen Mending a Sail (1885), he obtained a travelling scholarship allowing Holroyd to spend 1889-1891 in Rome, which had a lasting effect on both his work (in its subject matter) and future life, for in Rome he met the Australian artist Fannie Featherstonehaugh Macpherson, daughter of the Premier of Victoria.

At his return, on the invitation of Professor Alphonse Legros RE, he became for two years assistant-master at the Slade School, and there devoted himself to painting and etching.

[3] Among his compositions may be mentioned The Death of Torrigiano (1886), The Satyr King (1889), The Supper at Emmaus, and, perhaps his best picture, Pan and Peasants (1893).

[3] Holroyd made his chief reputation as an etcher of exceptional ability, combining strength with delicacy, and a profound and innate technical knowledge of the art.

Holroyd corresponded and swapped work with the French Symbolist artist, Pierre Puvis de Chavannes, who he greatly admired.

[3] According to the Encyclopædia Britannica Eleventh Edition, "[i]n all his work Holroyd displays an impressive sincerity, with a fine sense of composition, and of style, allied to independent and modern feeling.

[6] 1903 saw the publication of Holroyd’s 352 page book on the Renaissance genius Michaelangelo (“Michael Angelo Buonarotti”, published by Duckworth, London).

In London a comprehensive cross-section of 135 works displaying his drawing and etching prowess and practice are in the British Museum (see external links).

The majority of Holroyd’s etching copper plates, all but 22 of the total 287, some worked on both sides, are housed in the Ashmolean Museum, Oxford.

[11] In 2022 an on-line exhibition and illustrated publication of Holroyd’s etchings was compiled, written and curated by print-historian, Elizabeth Harvey-Lee, Hon.RE (see external links).