Frederick Richard Pickersgill RA (1820–1900) was born into a family of artists in London. His father, Richard Pickersgill, was a naval officer but also a keen amateur painter of marine and landscape subjects. His mother, Anne Witherington, was the sister of the artist William Frederick Witherington (1785–1865), while his paternal uncle was the eminent portrait painter Henry William Pickersgill (1782–1875). His cousin, Henry Hall Pickersgill (1812–1861), also became an artist.
He entered the Royal Academy Schools in 1837, where he trained in the academic tradition. Influenced by William Etty, he painted genre, historical and literary subjects, and began exhibiting at the Royal Academy in the early 1840s. He was elected an Associate of the Royal Academy in 1847 and became a full Royal Academician in 1857. In addition to painting, he worked as an illustrator and served as Keeper of the Royal Academy from 1873 to 1887. In 1856, John Ruskin called him 'already a Pre-Raphaelite in purpose', and a Pre-Raphaelite attention to detail can be seen in some of Pickersgill's work.
Pickersgill married Mary Hook, the sister of the landscape painter James Clarke Hook. After Mary's death he settled at Yarmouth on the Isle of Wight, where he died in 1900.
His work is represented in numerous public collections, including the V&A, Tate Gallery, National Portrait Gallery, and Manchester Art Gallery.
