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School of Art
Aberystwyth University
Buarth Mawr
Aberystwyth
Ceredigion
SY23 1NG

Tel: +44 (0)1970 622460

Fax: +44 (0)1970 622461

Email: artschool@aber.ac.uk

Display artist/maker:

Anthony Frederick Augustus Sandys

Born: 1829, UK, Norfolk, Norwich Died: 1904, UK, England, London, Kensington

Painter and illustrator. Son of a Norwich artist and brother of painter Emma Sandys (1843-77). Sandys started exhibiting locally already in 1839. In 1842, he received his first commission, painting birds of John Henry Gurney’s collection. He attended the Norwich School of Design from 1846 and won prizes at the Society of Arts, London, the same year and in 1847. The Reverend James Bulwer became an early patron in 1845, commissioning illustrations for his publications and portraits of his family. Sandys became well-known in London after publishing a caricature entitled ‘A Nightmare’, parodying John Everett Millais’s (1829-96) painting ‘Sir Isumbras at the Ford’ in 1857. He regularly exhibited at the Royal Academy between 1851 and 1886; a retrospective exhibition of his work was held there in 1905. Sandys designed illustrations for magazines such as ‘Cornhill Magazine’ and ‘Good Words’ as well as producing oil paintings such as ‘Oriana’, 1861, and many popular portraits drawn with crayon and chalk rather than painted in oil. Another important commission for eleven author portraits came from the publisher Macmillan in the 1880s. Birmingham City Art Gallery now holds the largest collection of his work.