Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Cary, Francis Stephen

1383193Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900, Volume 09 — Cary, Francis Stephen1887Lionel Henry Cust

CARY, FRANCIS STEPHEN (1808–1880), artist and art-teacher, was a younger son of the Rev. Henry Francis Cary [q. v.] He was born at Kingsbury in Warwickshire on 10 May 1808, his father being then vicar of that place. He was educated at home, chiefly by his father, and at the age of eighteen became a pupil of Mr. Sass at the Art School in Streatham Street, Bloomsbury. He afterwards became a student at the Royal Academy, and for a short time painted in the studio of Sir Thomas Lawrence, with a view of becoming his pupil; this intention was frustrated by the death of that artist. In 1829 he studied in Paris, and afterwards in Italy and in the Art School at Munich. In 1833, 1834, 1835 he accompanied his father, to whom he was much devoted, in a course of foreign travel each year. In the following years he exhibited several pictures at the exhibitions of the Society of British Artists and others. In 1841 he married Louisa, daughter of Charles Allen Philipps of St. Bride's Hill, Pembrokeshire, and in 1842 he undertook the management of the Art School in Bloomsbury, in which he had formerly studied under Mr. Sass. He continued to exhibit pictures for some years at the Royal Academy and elsewhere, and was a candidate in the Westminster Hall competitions for the decoration of the houses of parliament, held in 1844 and 1847. Cary was best known as the head of the Bloomsbury Art School. This school was founded by Mr. Sass on the model of the school of the Carracci, Bologna, and under his care, and subsequently under Cary's, many of the most prominent painters and sculptors of the day, such as Cope, Millais, Dante Rossetti, Armstead, &c., received their early art education. In 1874 Cary retired to Abinger in Surrey, where he died on 5 Jan. 1880. He left no family. In the early part of his life his continual devotion to his father was the cause of his enjoying much of the literary society of that day. He painted an interesting portrait of Charles Lamb and his sister Mary, now in the possession of Mr. Edward Hughes.

[Times, 9 Jan. 1880; Athenæum, 17 Jan. 1880; Art Journal, 1880, p. 108; Builder, xxxviii. 81; Catalogues of the Exhibitions of the Royal Academy, &c.; Life of the Rev. Henry Francis Cary; information from Mrs. Cary, and from Mr. Eyre Crowe, A.R.A.]

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