1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Sandby, Paul

SANDBY, PAUL (1725–1809), English water-colour painter, was born at Nottingham in 1725. In 1746 he was appointed by the duke of Cumberland draughtsman to the -survey of the Highlands. In 1752 he quitted this post and retired to Windsor, where he occupied himself with the production of water-colour drawings of scenery and architecture. Sir Joseph Banks commissioned him to bring out in aquatint (a method of engraving then peculiar to Sandby) forty-eight plates drawn during a tour in Wales. Sandby displayed considerable power as a caricaturist in his attempt to ridicule the opposition of Hogarth to the plan for creating a public academy for the arts. In 1768 he was chosen a foundation-member of the Royal Academy and appointed chief drawing-master to the Royal Military Academy at Woolwich. He held this situation till 1799. Sandby is best remembered, however, by his water-colour paintings. They are topographical in character, and, while they want the richness and brilliancy of modern water-colour, he nevertheless impressed upon them the originality of his mind. His etchings, such as the Cries of London and the illustrations to Ramsay's Gentle Shepherd, and his plates, such as those to Tasso's Jerusalem Delivered, are numerous and carefully executed. He died in London on the 9th of November 1809.