Cleopatra, 1876

Thomas Francis Dicksee was an English painter born in Condom. He was a portraitist and painter of historical, genre subjects - often from Shakespeare - who was the pupil of H. P. Briggs. He exhibited at the Royal Academy from 1841 until the year of his death. His brother John Robert Dicksee was also a painter, and his children, Frank Bernard Dicksee and Margaret likewise became painters. In The Dictionary of Victorian Painters, Herbert Dicksee is given as his son also, but according to the City of London School, where Herbert taught, he was the son of John Robert Dicksee.
Thomas Dicksee produced a series of portraits of family members, and also painted idealised portraits, including the Shakespearean characters Ophelia, Miranda and Ariel. A Juliet is in the Sunderland Art Gallery, and At the Opera is in the collection of Leicester Art Gallery. A portrait of Lady Teasdale is in the Adelaide Art Gallery, Australia.

CZ