PRIESTMAN, Bertram Walter

1868 - 1951

Bertram Walter Priestman was born at Clifford House, Girlington Road, Bradford, Yorkshire on 30 November 1868, son of the wealthy Quaker family of Edward Priestman (19 April 1838-8 August 1920), a worsted spinner & manufacturer, and his wife Henrietta née Broadhead (1839-12 September 1924), who married at Leeds, Yorkshire in 1862. In 1871, Bertram was a 2-year-old, living at Clifford House, with his parents 32-year-old Edward and 31-year-old Henrietta, with three siblings George Edward 7, Howard 5 and newly born Gertrude. Bertram was educated at the Friends’ School at Oliver’s Mount, Scarborough and at Bootham, Yorkshire and he enjoyed painting during the holidays with his uncle Arnold Priestman (1854-1925). Bertram studied watercolour painting under Edwin Moore (1813-1893) of York 1883-1886 and, when he left school, began an engineering course at Bradford Technical College, but gave this up to study at the Slade School of Fine Art in London where he remained for two terms under Alphonse Legros (1837-1911). Studio assistant to Sir William Llewellyn, PRA (1858-1941) who painted occasionally at Walberswick, Suffolk. Priestman exhibited at the Liverpool Academy of Arts from 1888, at the Royal Academy from 1890 when his 'In Dock for Repairs' was shown; the New English Art Club from 1894 and elsewhere. He married in London City in 1896, Grace Henwood (23 July 1868-1953) and in 1901 ‘an artist’ living at 29 Beauford Street, Chelsea with his 32-year-old wife and two of his four children Bryan, aged 4 and Olga, 10 months, who was educated at St Felix School, Southwold. In 1914 Priestman purchased ‘Windy Haugh’ at Walberswick, Suffolk, a house designed by Frank Jennings and added a studio in the garden where he tutored pupils, including Edward Seago. After a brief period away at Wharfedale in 1919, he returned to Walberswick where he remained until 1927. Elected to the Royal Society of British Artists in 1894; New English Art Club in 1896; Royal Institute of Oil Painters in 1910 and an Associate of the Royal Academy on 20 April 1916, a member on 26 June 1923 and a Senior on 1 January 1944. He made annual painting tours throughout East Anglia and could be seen chugging along in his 1908 vintage De Dion Bouton car seeking out new subjects to paint. In 1939, he and his wife Grace were living at Lionwood, Arnside, South Westmorland and he later moved to Snape Hall and then to Woodbridge, both in Suffolk. Although not a member, he exhibited at the Ipswich Art Club in 1932 from 101 Gunterstone Road, London W.14 an oil, 'The Deben above Wilford Bridge', in 1933 'Awaiting Cargo, Woodbridge', in 1937 from 22 Egerton Gardens, London SW.3, two oils, 'Billy, daughter of C.E.G. Bell, Esq.' and 'Her Last Mooring-Bembridge, I. of W.' and at the centenary exhibition in 1974 the Ipswich Museum loaned an oil on panel 'The Port of Ipswich' and his paintings are also held in galleries in Bradford, Leeds, Birmingham and other towns in the U.K. Bertram Walter Priestman died at St Giles, The Green, Crowborough, Sussex on 19 March 1951.

Royal Academy Exhibits
1890
1896
1897
1898
1900
1907
1908
1909
1910
1911
1912
1913
1914
1915
from Walberswick, Suffolk
1916 98 Waters of Washburne and Wharfe
459 The Heart of West Riding
1917 82 The Sunveiled Hills of Wharfedale
105 Snow in Buckden Vale
183 The Hillbound Village
357 Cliffs of the Winding Wharfe
386 The Great Grey Crag of Kilnsey
1918 114 The Walls of Langstrothdale
         164 In Wordsworth Country
         369 Limestone Fells
         518 October Snow on the Yorkshire Hills
1919 43 The Afterglow
         55 Great Langdale
         342 A Yorkshire Ghyll
         575 The Cool of the Morning
         594 Hayline among the Hills
         653 The Becks of Beckermonds
1920 44 The Giants Pollards of the Stour
90 His Majesty’s Mail
117 Early Morning, Buckden
180 The Valley of the Stour
1921 101 The Church on the Hill
269 Third Year Pollards
370 An Old Chalk Pit
429 The Moorings: Windermere
508 A Surrey Mill
1922 7 The Marsh
180 Poplars of the Maas
321 The Great Dutch Waterway
461 August
1923 65 An Essex Village
195 Gaitloch Bridge, Ross Shire
287 The Heart of Suffolk
1924
1925
1926
1927
1928
1929
1930
1931
1932
1933
1934
1935
1936
1937
1938
1939
from St Giles, Crowborough, Sussex
Boxtrees, Woodbridge, Suffolk
1941 44 Storm Clouds, North Wales
82 Whtibarrow Scar
182 The Flood Tide
514 The late Sir Anton Bertram, Chief Justice of Ceylon
1942
1943
1944
1945
1946
1947
1948
1949
1950
the late Bertram Priestman
1951 142 Thunder-clouds breaking
294 The Old White Horse
344 Smoke over Rochester River
372 Suffolk Waterway
625 The Road from the Watermeadows

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Works by This Artist