Thomas Girtin (1775–1802) was born in Southwark, London, the son of a wealthy brushmaker of Huguenot descent. Girtin learnt drawing as a boy, attending classes with topographical artist Thomas Malton (1748–1804), and later being apprenticed to the watercolourist Edward Dayes (1763–1804). While a teenager, Girtin became friends with the young J.M.W. Turner. The boys were employed to colour prints with watercolours. Girtin exhibited at the Royal Academy from 1794. He completed a number of sketching tours during his short life, journeying into the English countryside, visiting North Wales, the Lake District, Yorkshire and the West Country.
By 1799, he had acquired influential patrons such as Lady Sutherland and the art collector Sir George Beaumont. Girtin was the dominant member of the Brothers, a sketching society of professional artists and talented amateurs. In 1800, Girtin married Mary Ann Borrett and set up home in St George's Row, Hyde Park, next door to the painter Paul Sandby, but his health deteriorated until his death aged just twenty-seven in 1802. Turner is famously said to have remarked, 'Had Tom Girtin lived I should have starved.'
Thomas Girtin's work can be found in numerous public collections, including Tate Britain, the British Museum, Victoria and Albert Museum, National Galleries of Scotland, and the Yale Center for British Art, Newhaven.
