![]() ![]() Here he first met novelist William Makepeace Thackeray (1811-1863), who would become a lifelong friend when they met again at Punch in 1843. Wood engraver and illustrator Frederick George Kitton (1856-1904) claims in his biography of the illustrator (1883) that the artist John Flaxman (1755-1826) first noticed the boy’s skills when he was only three years old and advised the parents: “Do not let him be cramped with lessons in drawing let his genius follow its own bent he will astonish the world.” When Leech was seven, he started attending Charterhouse School, first as a day boy and then as a boarder. Leech junior enjoyed drawing from an early age. It was a well-respected and popular place, which must have been a very stimulating environment for a little boy to grow up in. By 1823, Leech senior owned the business. His father had moved from Ireland to London in about 1813 to work for his uncle, the proprietor of the London Coffee House in Ludgate Hill. He placed the drawings in such collections at the Museum of St George, Walkley, Sheffield (now the Ruskin Collection of Museum Sheffield).John Leech was born 29 th August 1817. Yet, even with his support, the scheme failed, and he himself was the largest purchaser. In 1872, they were exhibited at The Gallery, 9 Conduit Street with an accompanying catalogue written by Ruskin. ![]() In the following years, John Ruskin tried to help provide for the sisters of Leech, by organising the sale of his outline drawings. He had been married to Annie Eaton from 1842, and was father to a daughter and a son. ![]() Leech died at his home at 6 The Terrace, Kensington, London on 29 October 1864, and was buried at Kensal Green cemetery on 4 November, with Tenniel among his pall-bearers. As late as 1860, Leech received lessons in oils from another friend, John Everett Millais, in order to prepare for a – highly successful – exhibition at the Egyptian Hall (1862). Leech was instrumental in the ‘gentrification’ of Punch, and became well known for his many illustrations of sporting and hunting subjects, most notably for J R Surtees’s Handley Cross (1854). A former Charterhouse contemporary, Thackeray wrote in his obituary of Leech that ‘he always looked at society from the gentleman’s point of view’. He and Dickens collaborated on a number of books, beginning with A Christmas Carol (1843), and throughout the 1840s they holidayed together and shared the stage in some memorable amateur productions. During this period, he also developed close friendships with the novelists Charles Dickens and William Makepeace Thackeray. Two years later, he began to produce cuts regularly for the periodical, sharing work with John Tenniel, and excelling in images of fashionable life. Leech established himself with contributions to Bentley’s Miscellany in 1840, and in 1841 submitted a drawing to Punch. From 1838, he also took lessons from J Orrin Smith in wood engraving, the medium more widely used in British periodicals. Later he would meet the caricaturist Comte Amedée de Noë (known as ‘Cham’) and the painter Edouard Manet. In 1836, he gained further, direct experience of the handling of lithography when he visited Paris and fell under the influence of such French artists as Honoré Daumier and Paul Gavarni. Soon turning to his talent for drawing to develop a career, Leech produced a pamphlet – Etchings and Sketchings (1835) – in his preferred medium of lithography. However, he was forced to abandon this medical career following his father’s bankruptcy. Educated at Charterhouse School, he began to study medicine at St Bartholomew’s Hospital at the age of fifteen, and worked for a while as an apprentice doctor. His father, a native of Ireland, was the assistant proprietor of the London Coffee House on Ludgate Hill. John Leech was born at 28 Bennett Street, off Stamford Street, Southwark, London on 29 August 1817. John Leech (1817-1864) John Leech was a fluent and incisive draughtsman, who had great success as a cartoonist for Punch and as a literary illustrator, especially of John Surtees’ sporting subjects. ![]()
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |