John Sell Cotman, a distinguished member of the Norwich School, is renowned for his atmospheric landscapes and watercolours. His paintings embody the spirit of this influential movement, capturing the tranquil beauty of the English countryside with subtlety, technical skill, and poetic vision.
John Sell Cotman, a distinguished member of the Norwich School, is renowned for his atmospheric landscapes and watercolours. His paintings embody the spirit of this influential movement, capturing the tranquil beauty of the English countryside with subtlety, technical skill, and poetic vision.
This download features 36 hi-res images in JPEG format by the artist John Sell Cotman.
The images are all 600dpi and range in size from 2952 to 6610 pixels wide/tall.
The pictures are out of copyright and in the public domain, so you are free to use them in whatever way you'd like, including commercial use.
John Sell Cotman (1782-1842)was an English marine and landscape painter, etcher, illustrator, and a leading member of the Norwich School of painters.
John Sell Cotman was born in Norwich on 16 May 1782, the eldest child of Edmund Cotman and his wife Ann (née Sell) living at 26 Bridge Street, in St George's parish. Edmund Cotman was a hairdresser who later became a silk merchant and a lace dealer.
The young Cotman was educated at Norwich Grammar School and is recorded as starting there as a non-paying pupil on 3 August 1793. He showed a talent for art from an early age and would often go out on drawing trips into the countryside around Norwich and the North Norfolk coast. A story survives that the boy's headmaster, Dr Samuel Forster, disliked cats. When Forster saw a large, realistic-looking cardboard cat on his desk, he held the silhouette up, saying, "I know who is the only boy who could have drawn this."
Cotman moved to London, probably in 1798. He lived at 28 Gerrard Street, Soho, initially making a living through commissions from print-sellers. His sketches at Rudulph Ackerman's print shop at 96 The Strand were studied by the Norwich artist John Thirtle when a young man. Cotman came under the patronage of Thomas Munro, physician to the Bridewell and Bethlehem Hospitals, whose house in Adelphi Terrace was a studio and a meeting place for artists that had included the young J.M.W. Turner and Thomas Girtin. Read more.
The pictures in our collections are out of copyright in the United States, the UK, Canada, most of Europe, Australia and all countries that follow the lifetime plus 70 years rule. Read our blog post about public domain copyright rules for more information.
