The Postcard Artists
Black, Montague Birrell               B. 1889
Not much seems to be known about this artist who painted many postcards for the White Star Line, particularly before World War I. He had a very attractive style of painting. He lived in Liverpool.
Brown, Samuel John Milton         1873 - 1963
Sam Brown was born in Liverpool on 13 April 1873, the son of Edward Brown, a dispensing chemist and Post Master who was an outstanding amature artist. Brown senior encouraged his son to become an artist and when he left Liverpool College at the age of fourteen he was apprenticed to a firm of lithographic artists. Sam Brown spent all his spare time around Liverpool docks learning the "feel" of ships and, because many sailing vessels still used the port in those years, it is said of him that he quite often spent hours aloft studying the rigging of these magnificent vessels.
He studied art at the Liverpool School of Art and then, throughout a long career as a Liverpool artist, he made his living by painting maritime subjects and supplying artwork to shipping companies. Some of his most attractive work was done for postcards and in particular the work that he produced for Thomas Forman and Sons in Nottingham, is much valued by the collector.
Much of his life Brown lived in Wallasey but on the death of his father in 1936 he moved to North Wales. Sadly, in his later years he suffered from increasing blindness and, like many artists, he was in somewhat reduced circumstances. He died in 1963 at the age of 90.
Chapelet, Roger
Roger Chapelet was a poster artist working in Paris in the late 1950's to the early 1960's.
Church, Bernard W.
Bernard Church is best known for his aviation and shipping postcards which he designed for the publishers J. Salmon and Company. He was active around the period of World War II.
Dixon, Charles    RI       1872 - 1934
Charles Dixon was born at Goring in Surrey and had his first work accepted by the Royal Academy at the age of sixteen. He was elected to the RI at the age of twenty-eight and made his living by working as a commercial artist for the Graphic and other magazines of the period. He addresses himself to all kinds of maritime subjects and was particularly happy in watercolors. Himself a keen yachtsman, he had a great knowledge of sailing ships and in 1901 he co-operated with C. N. Robinson to produce a book called "Britannia's Bulwarks" which was packed with Dixon's illustrations of historical sailing ships and contemporary warships. He supplied many paintings for various postcard companies.
Today Dixon's work is much sought after and fetches very large sums at auction, particularly his watercolors of shipping scenes on the Thames which are especially attractive.
Fry, John H.
John Fry was another artist who produced shipping scenes for the publishers J. Salmon and Company. His style is primitive and, to some tastes, unattractive.
Gribble, Bernard Finegan             1873 - 1962
Bernard Gribble was born in London, the son of an architect who designed Brompton Oratory. He followed his father into the architectural profession but later turned to painting and exhibited at the Royal Academy from 1891 to 1904. In his later years he lived in Dorset.
Hopkinson, C. F.
C. F. Hopkinson was an artist used by Cunard in the late 1940's and his work appears on postcards published by Forman and Sons for the Cunard Company.
DeLacey, Charles            c. 1885 - 1930
Charles DeLacey is best known as a press artist for the Illustrated London News and he also, for a time, had an appointment as an official artist to the Port of London Authority. He exhibited at the Royal Academy and is known for his studies of the River Thames and its scenery. His work is often compared to that of W. L. Wyllie.
Lachotte, Marchard L.
Marchard Lachotte was a French poster artist working in the Art Deco period.
McDowell, William John Patton           1888 - 1950
William McDowell was born in Barrow-in-Furness and grew up there. Like many other Barrow schoolboys, he left school at fourteen and served an appreticeship at the famous Vickers Shipyard. He entered the drawing office at Vickers and this is, perhaps, why his paintings look so accurate and precise. Certainly he grew to know all about the construction of ships while at the Barrow yard.
Following the end of World War I, he left Vickers and became a full-time marine artist, specializing in commerial work for the large shipping companies, although he accepted a number of private commissions. McDowell is another artist whose work is now recognized by collectors and much sought after.
Mann, James Scrymgeour       RI, PRCA           1883 - 1946
James Mann was of Scots origin, born in Dundee, and was son and grandson of captains in the merchant service. The family maintained the sea-going tradition by James' brother, Robert, who became Commodore of the Bibby Line. Mann served in World War I in which he was wounded and afterwards he always walked with a limp. Following his war service, he studied at the Liverpool School of Art, coming to Liverpool because of his great interest in shipping.
Mann was a great watercolorist and the delicate nature of many of his marine paintings give them a special air of authority. He produced postcard artwork for all the main Liverpool companies including Cunard and White Star, and a particularly attractive series for Bibby Line. Much of his Cunard work was published by Forman and Sons.
In 1942 he was elected President of the Royal Cambrian Academy, an honor which gave him much pleasure. He died in Llandudno in 1946. Today his work is known far beyond Liverpool and is attractive to collectors.
Mason, Frank         RI           1876 - 1965
Frank Mason was born in Yorkshire and began his career at sea, being educated as a cadet on HMS Conway. He served in the Royal Navy in World War I, and then became a war artist. A number of his pictures from this period are in the Imperial War Museum. He became a full-time artist between the two wars and worked as an illustrator, poster artist for railway companies and supplying posters and postcards for shipping companies. He exhibited at the Royal Academy from 1900 onwards and was elected RI in 1929.
Nicholson, John                 b. 1920
John Nicholson is well known for his attractive color illustrations in many of today's shipping magazines. He lives and works in Leeds and is particularly well known for his illustrations of paddle-steamers and oceanliners. His early work for J. Salmon and Company is now the target of collectors.
Oliver, Richard  
Little appears to be known of this artist and his work.
Pennington, Oswald F.
Oswald Franklyn Pennington (1885-1953) was born at Southport, Lancashire, England.  He went to sea as a youth apprentice in the four-masted barque Carradale and gained his master's certificate in sail on August 12, 1913.  He was cartoonist and general artist of the Liverpool Journal of Commerce in 1913 and 1914 . During WWI he was commander of the HMS Rugby with a complement of one hundred officers and men.  He was the DSC and took part in extensive post war clearance operations before being demobilised in 1920.  He served aboard the Empress of France, the Empress of Australia, the Duchess of York, the Duchess of Bedford, Montcalm, and the Empire Magpie as well as the Winnipeg II which was torpedoed in l942.  These Canadian Pacific Ships were managed for the Government of Canada.  Oswald was staff captain on the Empress of Britain when she was torpedoed on 28 October 1940.  He lived in Montreal until l952 when he returned to England.  Throughout his career he made sketchs and drawings of sailing ships as well as the Canadian Pacific liners.  Many of these were produced as postcards and given to passengers.
Courtesy of The Reverend Jasper Green Pennington, Pennington Library & Archives, 204 Elm Street, Ypsilanti, Michigan 48197.
Rosenvinge, Odin                1880 - 1957
Born at Newcastle-upon-Tyne of Danish decent, Rosenvinge was brought up with the sea in his background. He had a natural ability for art and, when he left school, following a short time as a trainee reporter, he joined a Leeds commercial art and printing firm. When he was thirty-two he moved to Liverpool and joined the firm of Turner and Dunett who had clients among all the major shipping companies. Here he worked together with Walter Thomas who acted as his assistant.
Odin Rosenvinge was one of the most prolific for the poster artists and developed a clear style of his own. His experience in the Middle East, where he served during World War I, led him to use brighter colors to get good effects and much of his work which dates from the 1920's contains striking tones of orange. Later on in life, when he was in his fifties, his employers went into liquidation and Rosenvinge turned to freelance. At the height of his powers, his work ranks with anything that Dixon or Spurling could produce and it is surprising that he is so little known among conventional maritime art collectors.
Shoesmith, Kenneth Denton         RI           1890 - 1939
Born in Halifax in Yorkshire, Kenneth Shoesmith was brought up in Blackpool and showed early talent as an artist. He decided to make a career at sea and became a cadet on HMS Conway. On leaving Conway he joined the Royal Mail Line and, while he followed the career of a Merchant Officer with that well-known company, he continued his enthusiasm for drawing and painting. He was mostly self taught but undertook a correspondence course early in his career as an artist and seems to have derived great benefit from this.
Shoesmith's style changed considerably during his life. In his early years he had a natural flowing style but this became more in the 'Art Deco' made later on. Between the wars he worked for the publishers Thomas Forman who had sole rights to producing Cunard postcards and much attractive work survived. There is also a collection of this work in the Ulster Museum, Belfast.
Silas, Ellis                1883 - 1971
Ellis Silas, born in 1883, was a watercolor painter who specialized in marine subjects and spent considerable time in the Far East. He has pictures currently held in the collection of the National Maritime Museum and he exhibited at the Royal Academy and Royal Institute.
Smith, John S.                 fl.  1940's - 1950's
John Smith is a contemporary artist who has exhibited at the RSMA.
Smoothy, Derrick O.
Derrick Smoothy is a contemporary artist who has exhibited at the RSMA from 1950 and is well known for his portraits of modern oceanliners.
Enquiries about his work can be made to the Parker Gallery, Pimlico Road, London, SW1.
Spurling, John Robert Charles (Jack)                    1870 - 1933
Jack Spurling was born in Suffolk on December 12, 1870. His father was a jute merchant and it was this trade that gave the boy his taste of teh sea. His talent was an artist showed early and he himself said that his one pleasure as a boy was painting ships and he spent many of his holidays along the London dock side. He went to sea under sail at the age of sixteen and in the following years gained the knowledge and experience which led him to produce a series of paintings of square riggers which remain unmatched for their realism and popularity. As a painter of ships' portraits, Spurling has no equal and the series of postcards which he produced for P&O remanis among the best ever published by a shipping company.
After seven years at sea, Spurling came ashore to practice, in turn, marine painting and then acting. At the latter profession he enjoyed some success and he never seemed to have been in any economic difficulty all his life. Later on, his attention turned more and more to painting and before he died at the age of sixty-two, he had produced some of the best marine paintings ever. Much of his work was destroyed during World War II and is now very rare.
Thomas, Walter          ARCA                1870 - 1933
As mentioned earlier, Walter Thomas worked with Odin Rosenvinge in Liverpool for much of his career, of which very little is known. He did much work for the Blue Funnel Line and worked for them for most of his career. After acting as an Admiralty artist during World War II he went freelance in the 1950's when he moved from Liverpool to live in the Isle of Man.
Turner, Charles E.                     1893 - 1965
Charles Turner was another Liverpool artist, Lancastrian born, whose work in the 1920's for Taylor, Garnett, Evans and Company led to a series of excellent postcards. Later his work was used by Thomas Forman and his pictures of the Queen Mary and Queen Elizabeth for Cunard are full of action. He served in the Royal Air Force in World War I and as a war artist in World War II. His battle pictures of the loss of Bismark and Scharnhorst are in the National Maritime Museum, Greenwich. He died in Looe, Cornwall on April 14, 1965.
Wilkinson, Norman          CBE, PRI                1878 - 1971
Norman Wilkinson was born in Cambridge but the family moved to Portsmouth and he studied at the Portsmouth School of Art and also at St. Ives. He did early work for the Illustrated London News and worked for them until he entered the Royal Navy during World War I. After the war he emerged as one of the best known poster designers in the country, working for shipping and railway companies. He was a keen yachtsman but also very interested in aviation and during World War II he served in the Royal Air Force. His work covers every aspect of maritime life and continues to grow in popularity.
Wyllie, William Lionel          RA                1851 - 1931
Born in London to an artistic family, Wyllie was educated at the Royal Academy School which he joined in 1865. He exhibited his first painting at the Academy in 1868. Wyllie had an excessive love of the sea and his output is prolific, covering all kinds of maritime subjects but with a great interest in the Royal Navy and historic occasions. He does not seem to have engaged in much work of a poster or postcard nature but a series he supplied to P&O in the first decade of the twenty-first century is quite charming. Among his many interests Wyllie, who lived at Portsmouth in his later years, was a member of the committee that carried out the restoration of HMS Victory under preservation in a dry-dock in Portsmouth dockyard.
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