Dictionary of National Biography, 1927 supplement/Riviere, Briton
RIVIERE, BRITON (1840–1920), painter, the youngest child of William Riviere [q.v.] by his wife, Ann, daughter of Joseph Jarvis, of Atherston, Warwickshire, was born in London 14 August 1840. The family, which originally bore the name of Nerac, came to England from the Bordeaux district after the revocation of the Edict of Nantes. Briton Riviere's mother was a good musician and had some talent for drawing. His grandfather, Daniel Valentine Riviere, his uncle, Henry Parsons Riviere [q.v.], as well as his father, were painters and teachers of drawing, and altogether nine bearers of the name, including his wife, are to be found in the list of exhibitors at the Royal Academy. Another uncle, Robert Riviere [q.v.], was a well-known book-binder. Briton received his education and his first training in art at Cheltenham College, where his father was drawing-master. From thence he sent in 1851 and 1852 to the exhibitions at the British Institution, two little oil-paintings of kittens. In 1858, with ‘The Broken Chain’, he began the series of works annually shown at the Royal Academy, with one short interruption of four years, till the end of his long life; the last picture, ‘Michael’, an old shepherd with his dog, was sent in a fortnight before he died.
Between 1860 and 1863 Riviere was attracted, mainly under the influence of his future brother-in-law, Clarence Dobell, by the aims and methods of the pre-Raphaelites. He painted, in accordance with their principles, ‘Elaine on the Barge’, ‘Hamlet and Ophelia’, and other pictures, all in turn rejected by the Academy, which had previously shown itself appreciative of his work. Helped by his experience to realize his own congenial sphere, the painter returned to the path by which he was to reach artistic and popular success. Meanwhile his parents had moved in 1859 from Cheltenham to Oxford. In 1863 Briton matriculated at St. Mary Hall. The authorities did not require him to reside, and he continued to live and paint under his father's roof, while reading for a degree. He took his B.A. in 1866 and his M.A. in 1873. In 1867 he married. His wife was Mary Alice, sister of Clarence and Sydney Thompson Dobell [q.v.], and daughter of John Dobell, of Detmore, a property, near Cheltenham, which figures as ‘Longfield’ in John Halifax, Gentleman. The young couple lived first at Keston, Kent, and then at Bromley. In 1871 they moved to London, and finally settled at 82 Finchley Road.
Life in London brought Riviere the stimulating friendship of other painters. He became closely attached to, and much influenced by, the artists of the new Scottish school, Orchardson, Pettie, Peter Graham, and MacWhirter. It is not too much to say that his first conception of a colour scheme, instead of a black and white scheme, as a basis for a picture came to him from them, and that his fine use of broken, shimmering colour was developed by his association with these friends. Besides exhibiting in oil and water-colour at the Royal Academy, the Dudley Gallery, and later, the Grosvenor Gallery, Riviere worked for Punch, chiefly in decorative initials, and drew illustrations for English and American magazines, notably for Good Words, and for some of the novels of Mrs. Craik. The list of his exhibits at the Royal Academy includes portraits and etchings, and also some sculpture. He was elected associate in 1877 and academician in 1880. After the death of Sir John Millais (1896) he narrowly missed election as president, somewhat to his relief, it was believed, as delicate health had long precluded him from social and official activities. In 1891 his university conferred upon him the honorary degree of D.C.L., and Oriel College elected him to an honorary fellowship in 1910. A man of distinguished presence, courteous manner, and wide culture, Riviere had many friends. He died in London 20 April 1920. He had five sons, one of whom, Hugh Goldwin Riviere, is the well-known portrait painter, and two daughters.
A portrait of Riviere by Sir H. von Herkomer is in the Royal Academy, and another excellent likeness, by the same painter, figures in the group of the ‘Hanging Committee of the Royal Academy’ in the Tate Gallery. A bronze head by Onslow Ford is in the Common Room at Oriel College.
There are six pictures by Riviere in the Tate Gallery, among which are the ‘Miracle of the Gadarene Swine’, ‘Giants at Play’, ‘Beyond Man's Footsteps’, and a study for ‘Sympathy’, the finished picture of which is, with ‘An Anxious Moment’, at the Royal Holloway College. ‘The Last Spoonful’ is in the Schwabe collection at Hamburg, ‘A Roman Holiday’ in the gallery at Sydney. ‘The King Drinks’, one of his many lion pictures, is in the Diploma Gallery, and a noble ‘Prometheus’, painted in 1889, was given by his family to the Ashmolean Museum, Oxford, in 1920, in accordance with his wishes. A water-colour drawing, ‘Fox and Geese’, is in the Victoria and Albert Museum.
In the popular mind Riviere occupied the place of successor to Sir Edwin Landseer. Without Landseer's amazingly facile draughtsmanship and bravura brushwork, Riviere possessed the more serious and solid mentality of his own age: this restrained him also from the over-infusion of human traits and feelings into his animals, which was Landseer's besetting fault. Riviere himself took most interest and pride in those of his pictures in which animal life, or at least its more homely and humorous aspects, played least part. Works like the beautiful ‘Ganymede’ (in the possession of his family), the ‘Prometheus’, and the ‘Gadarene Swine’ show how fully he was justified in this, and cause regret that the public should have fastened upon his groups of children and dogs, admirable in their way, as his most characteristic productions.
[The Times, 21 April 1920; Sir W. Armstrong, Briton Riviere, R.A.; His Life and Work, with list of works till 1891, illustrated, in The Art Annual, 1891; Wilfrid Meynell, Some Modern Artists and their Work, illustrated, 1883; Algernon Graves, The Royal Academy of Arts, Dictionary of Contributors, 1905–1906; Catalogues of the Exhibitions of the Royal Academy of Arts 1904–20.]