British-born Australian Painter, 1856-1931 Australian painter of English birth. A leader of the HEIDELBERG SCHOOL and pioneer of plein-air Impressionism in Australia, he has been described as 'the father of Australian landscape painting'. Having moved to Melbourne in 1869, he studied at the East Collingwood and Carlton Schools of Design and the National Gallery of Victoria's School of Art (1874-81) while working as a photographic assistant. He led sketching expeditions with Frederick McCubbin and initiated student requests for reforms at the school. Returning to England, he enrolled in the Royal Academy Schools, London, on 6 December 1881, officially recommended by Edwin Long. In the summer of 1883 he toured Spain with the painter John Peter Russell. He learnt something of French Impressionism from Spanish art students Ramon Casas and Loreano Barrau (b 1864), and then followed the latter's advice to visit the Academie Julian in Paris. He returned to Melbourne in 1885 and the following year established the first summer camp at Box Hill with McCubbin and Louis Abrahams (1852-1903), portrayed in his painting the Artists' Camp (c. 1886; Melbourne, N.G. Victoria). According to the painter Arthur Streeton, it was Roberts's 'quick perception and expression of the principles of Impressionism in the year 1886,  Related Paintings of Tom roberts :. | Storm at sea | Clouds | Allegro con brio:Bourke Street | Captain Broomfield | corroboree (nn02) |
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Karl Nordstrom
Swedish Painter, 1855-1923 was a Swedish painter and one of the leading members of Konstnärsförbundet, which he chaired from 1896 until its dissolution in 1920. Born on Gotland, but growing up on Tjörn on the Swedish West Coast, Nordström studied at principskolan, the preparatory school of the Royal Academy of Arts in Stockholm and the private painting school of Edvard Perseus, but was never promoted to the "Antique school" of the Academy but had to continue on his own. Traveling to Paris in 1881, he was influenced by the impressionists. He spent a couple of years in Grez-sur-Loing, the site of an important colony of Scandinavian artists, practising his plein air painting in the strong French sunlight. In 1885, he joined the group of young artists protesting against the policies and leadership of the Academy, and he was ever since 1886 one of the leading members of Konstnärsförbundet, the formalization of the opposition group. He was its chairman from 1896 until its dissolution in 1920. In 1886, he married xylographer and photographer Tekla Lindeström in Paris. Later the same year, he settled on Tjörn, using what he had learnt in France about light and colours to depict the landscape where he had grown up. He spent the summer of 1889 in Visby. Around 1890, he moved from his earlier impressionism towards a more synthetist style. His influences came from Japanese art, which he had encountered in Paris, and from Gauguin, whose paintings he first saw in photographs he had received from Ivan Agueli. One of Nordström's old friends from the time at the Academy and in Perseus' school, Nils Kreuger, had lived in the city of Varberg since 1888. He convinced Nordström to move there in 1892, and they were joined by another of their old friends, Richard Bergh, in 1893.
Jean-Joseph-Xavier Bidauld
(1758 - 1846) was a French painter. A native of the city of Carpentras, Bidauld first studied painting with his elder brother, Jean-Pierre-Xavier, in Lyons. In 1783 he traveled to Paris, there winning the favor of an art dealer and perfume seller named Dulac. This latter subsidized Bidauld's travels in Italy, where for five years he lived in Rome and traveled widely. Most of his contacts within the French artistic community in that city were history painters. In 1790 Bidauld returned to Paris; in 1791 he entered the Salon for the first time. Thereafter he participated regularly. In 1792 he began receiving official commissions, and in 1823 he became the first landscape painter elected to the Academie des Beaux-Arts. 1825 saw him awarded the Legion d'honneur. His reputation began to decline at about this time; as a member of the Salon jury, he was seen as blocking a new generation of landscape painters from gaining entry. Chief among these was Theodore Rousseau. Bidauld was savaged in the press, and as a result became unable to sell his work. By the time of his death, he was near penury.
Anton Hickel
(1745 - October 30, 1798) was an 18th-century painter. Hickel was born in Český Krumlov, Bohemia, and enrolled in the Academy of Fine Arts Vienna in Vienna, Austria in 1758. After graduation, he worked as a painter under his brother, Joseph Hickel, who was also a painter. Beginning in 1779, he served as a traveling portrait painter. He spent considerable time in Munich where he painted Charles Theodore, Elector of Bavaria, among others. He then traveled in southern Germany, Switzerland, then to Mannheim and Mainz. He moved to Switzerland in 1785, and then became the official court painter of Joseph II, Holy Roman Emperor. In 1786, he travelled to France where he painted under the patronage of Marie Antoinette and Marie-Louise, princesse de Lamballe. He died in Hamburg.