John Alfred Arnesby Brown (British painter) 1866 - 1955
Sir John Alfred Arnesby Brown RA (29 March 1866 in Nottingham – 16 November 1955 in Haddiscoe, Norfolk) was an English landscape artist, "one of the leading British landscape artists of the 20th century" and best known for his impressionistic depictions of pastoral landscapes, often featuring cattle. Arnesby Brown first studied at the Nottingham School of Art in the late 1880s. He has been called "the artist Nottingham forgot", with little remaining reference to him in Nottingham. He later studied at the Bushey School of Art in Hertfordshire for four years from 1889. After exhibiting at the Royal Academy for the first time in 1890, he became an elected Associate there in 1903. In 1896 he married Mia Edwards (1870–1931), a painter who studied at Bushey under Sir Hubert von Herkomer. They lived in Norfolk and St Ives, Cornwall. Arnesby Brown was knighted in 1938. He died in 1955, having not painted since 1942 due to blindness. He is buried in the cemetery of the Parish Church of St Mary in his hometown of Haddiscoe, Norfolk. His brother Eric Brown (1877–1939) was the first director of the National Gallery of Canada, from 1912 till 1939. Source: Wikipedia * * * Mia Arnesby Brown (née Edwards) (British painter) 1867 - 1931 Mia Arnesby Brown, née Mia Edwards (1867–1931) was a Welsh painter. She was particularly noted for her portraits of children. Mia Sarah H. Edwards was born in Cwmbran, Monmouthshire, daughter of Rev. Charles Smallwood Edwards and paternal granddaughter of Rev. Loderwick Edwards, who had been the Vicar of Rhymney. She studied under Sir Hubert von Herkomer at Bushey. In 1894, she exhibited at the Nottingham Castle Exhibition of Cornish Painters as Mia Edwards. She showed at least five pieces at the Royal Cambrian Academy of Art under her maiden name. In 1896, she married John Arnesby Brown. The couple spent the summer and autumn months in Norfolk and the winter and spring in St Ives, Cornwall. St. Ives was the home of an artists' colony, whose painters participated in the Newlyn School of Open Air Art. She often showcased her works featuring children with the likes of Marianne Stokes and Elizabeth Forbes. One of her best-known works was a portrait of a daughter of the novelist Charles Marriott. In 1906 her piece, Shirley Poppies, was exhibited at the Royal Academy of Arts in London and in a 1913 exhibit of Welsh artists, she gained acclaim for Mary Reading and The Garden Boy. The Amgueddfa Cymru, the National Museum of Wales houses The Garden Boy in its collections. She also has three paintings housed at the Norfolk Museums, Norwich: Girl Fishing (1918), Sleeping Girl (1931) and Thomas South Mack as a Small Boy (undated). Her work, Country Girl, is part of the collection of Leamington Spa Art Gallery. Eventually, the couple settled in the village of Haddiscoe, Norfolk, where Mia Arnsby Brown died suddenly in 1931.
