Artist. Joseph Austin Benwell was an English Orientalist artist, engraver, and illustrator. Many of his paintings and engravings were based on his travels in the Near and Middle East, China and India, often featuring camel caravans, Arab scenes and depictions of Indian life. He was born on May 26, 1816 at 35 Canterbury Square, Southwark, London, the second son of Joseph Benwell, an accountant, and his wife Charlotte, into a Quaker family. His first job was in Bristol at a land surveyor in the 1830s after his family moved there in the 1820s. He then joined the East India Company and lived in Calcutta for several years. Returning to Bristol before 1851, he soon moved to London, where his career as an artist took off, initially as an illustrator and wood engraver. He worked for the "Illustrated London News" and also illustrated many books and journals, including the publications of the Religious Tract Society, and executed a famous engraving of Florence Nightingale during the 1850s and early 1860s. He traveled to the Middle East in the mid-1860s, and it is on his return that he started producing his Orientalist watercolors. He exhibited at the Royal Academy and other art venues all over the country. He died at his home, Abingdon Villas in Kensington, London, on May 13, 1886.
Artist. Joseph Austin Benwell was an English Orientalist artist, engraver, and illustrator. Many of his paintings and engravings were based on his travels in the Near and Middle East, China and India, often featuring camel caravans, Arab scenes and depictions of Indian life. He was born on May 26, 1816 at 35 Canterbury Square, Southwark, London, the second son of Joseph Benwell, an accountant, and his wife Charlotte, into a Quaker family. His first job was in Bristol at a land surveyor in the 1830s after his family moved there in the 1820s. He then joined the East India Company and lived in Calcutta for several years. Returning to Bristol before 1851, he soon moved to London, where his career as an artist took off, initially as an illustrator and wood engraver. He worked for the "Illustrated London News" and also illustrated many books and journals, including the publications of the Religious Tract Society, and executed a famous engraving of Florence Nightingale during the 1850s and early 1860s. He traveled to the Middle East in the mid-1860s, and it is on his return that he started producing his Orientalist watercolors. He exhibited at the Royal Academy and other art venues all over the country. He died at his home, Abingdon Villas in Kensington, London, on May 13, 1886.
Bio by: Anonymous
Inscription
JOSEPH AUSTIN BENWELL
Gravesite Details
Fallen headstone located on the west side of Cambridge Avenue beneath a chestnut tree. Inscription illegible apart from JOSEPH AUSTIN BENWELL and MARIAN BENWELL (wife, buried in same grave March 1892), and a few words such as 'loving'.
Family Members
Advertisement
