Richard Parkes Bonington

Though he is celebrated as a deeply influential artist amongst scholars of British and French early 19th century painting, Richard Parkes Bonington unfortunately died too early in his career (at 26) to realize the full potential of his contributions to Western art. Bonington drew on an amalgam of styles to create an entirely unique and Modern oeuvre. The artist moved to France at age 15, where his career fully commenced, and where he met Eugène Delacroix at age 16. Inspired by Old Masters from across Europe, Bonington brought a British painterly sensibility to the French art world that helped establish the parameters of Romanticism—a genre his colleague John Constable would come to be the poster-child of.