John Atkinson Grimshaw oil on canvas, 30.5 x 46 cm.c. 1889(1889)
cjr The Broomielaw (6 September 1836 - 13 October 1893) was a Victorian-era artist, a "remarkable and imaginative painter" known for his city night-scenes and landscapes.
His early paintings were signed "JAG," "J. A. Grimshaw," or "John Atkinson Grimshaw," though he finally settled on "Atkinson Grimshaw."
John Atkinson Grimshaw was born 6 September 1836 in Leeds. In 1856 he married his cousin Frances Hubbard (1835-1917). In 1861, at the age of 24, to the dismay of his parents, he left his job as a clerk for the Great Northern Railway to become a painter. He first exhibited in 1862, mostly paintings of birds, fruit and blossom, under the patronage of the Leeds Philosophical and Literary Society. He became successful in the 1870s and rented a second home in Scarborough, which became a favourite subject.
Several of his children, Arthur Grimshaw (1864-1913), Louis H Grimshaw (1870-1944), Wilfred Grimshaw (1871-1937) and Elaine Grimshaw (1877-1970) became painters.
