Herbert James Draper
Victorian mythological classicist painter
Herbert James Draper was an English Classicist painter whose career began in the Victorian era and extended through the first two decades of the 20th century. Born in London, the son of a jeweller named Henry Draper and his wife Emma, he was educated at Bruce Castle School in Tottenham and then went on to study art at the Royal Academy. He undertook several educational trips to Rome and Paris between 1888 and 1892, having won the Royal Academy Gold Medal and Travelling Studentship in 1889. In the 1890s, he worked as an illustrator, eventually settling in London. Draper's most productive period began in 1894. He focused mainly on mythological themes from ancient Greece. His painting The Lament for Icarus (1898) won the gold medal at the Exposition Universelle in Paris in 1900 and was later bought for the Tate Gallery by the Chantrey Trustees. He was also responsible for the decoration of the ceiling of the Drapers' Hall in the City of London. Though Draper was neither a member nor an associate of the Royal Academy, he took part in the annual expositions from 1890 on. In later years as the public tastes changed and mythological scenes became less popular he concentrated more on portraits.
Artworks by this artist (32 total)
- Ariadne
- Sea Melodies
- Studies For The Singing Priestess In Song
- Study for ‘Song’
- Study For The Kelpie
- For Saint Dorothea’s Day 1899
- A Deep Sea Idyll
- The Wrath Of The Sea God
- Studies for Ceres and Juno in ‘Prospero Summoning Nymphs and Deities’
- The Lament for Icarus 1898
- Studies of a man’s draped waist, and head
- Study of a Water-nymph for ‘Prospero Summoning Nymphs and Deities’
- Female nude study for ‘The Lament for Icarus’.
- Art and the Jade 1906
- The Spirit Of The Fountain 1891
- Full-length nude study of Mary Best for ‘Tristram and Yseult’
- A nude study of a woman
- Female nude study for ‘The Lament for Icarus’
- First sketch for ‘Icarus’
- Ulysses And The Sirens Circa 1909