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Edward Steel Harper RBSA (1878-1951)


Edward Steel Harper, RBSA (1878-1951)

The work of the Birmingham artist, Edward Steel Harper, possesses a distinctive quality that combines late Pre-Raphaelitism with something more modern.

Though very little has been written about his life and works, Edward Steel Harper is known as a landscape painter in oil. He produced work that possesses a distinctive quality that combines late Pre-Raphaelitism with something more modern.

Edward Steel Harper was born in Handsworth, Birmingham on 11 June 1878, living much of his life at 55 Moorpool Avenue, in the Birmingham suburb of Harborne.

Harper was the eldest of three children, all of whom became professional artists following family tradition. He was the son of Edward Samuel Harper (1854-1941), a portrait, figure and genre painter, who had a significant role in the artistic life of Birmingham. He was Honorary Secretary and Professor of Anatomy at the Royal Birmingham Society of Artists (RBSA), Director of the Life Academy at Birmingham School of Art (1880-1919) and Art Critic for the Birmingham Post.

Harper was educated locally at King Edward VI High School and studied at Birmingham School of Art. The origins of this institution lie with the RBSA, which founded this nationally significant government school in 1843.

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