Augustus Wall Callcott was born on 20 February 1779. His father was a builder and his brother Dr John Wall Callcott, would become a noted composer. Augustus initially trained as a musician and was a chorister at Westminster Abbey for six years under Dr Cooke. However, he chose not to follow the musical career mapped out for him and entered the Royal Academy Schools in 1797, while studying under the portraitist John Hoppner (1758-1810). His first exhibited oil painting at the RA was a portrait of Miss Roberts, in the tradition of his teacher. However, it was as a painter of picturesque landscapes and genre scenes that Callcott would find fame and success. Calcott was born, and lived all his life, in the area of west London known as Kensington Gravel Pits, just south of Notting Hill Gate. Like fellow artists William Mulready and John Linnell, he made a practice of studying and painting outdoors in the area. It has been noted that Calcott’s style was influenced by the rustic landscapes of Thomas Gainsborough. In 1801 he was a member of the Sketching Society (also known as The Brothers), and some of his earliest landscapes were watercolours. He produced three for Edward, Viscount Lascelles in 1804, but preferred to paint ideal and picturesque landscapes in oils, rather than topographical watercolours. By 1805 he had established his reputation and attracted an aristocratic clientele. He painted slowly, judiciously exhibiting only one picture a year, in a luminous style influenced by Dutch Old Masters. His work proved popular with the major patrons of the day, including Sir John Leicester, Richard Payne Knight and Sir Richard Colt Hoare. He first exhibited at the British Institution in 1806 and continued to do so for over 30 years. It has been noted that his two principal subject pictures Raphael and the Fornarina, and Milton dictating to his Daughters, are much inferior to his landscapes, which are placed in the highest class by their refined taste and quiet beauty. Callcott was a close friend and admirer of J M W Turner (1775-1851). The two artists were often influenced by each other and like Turner, Callcott was fascinated by atmospheric effects. His landscapes and marine works tended to be simple and almost abstract in composition, to provide a clear stage for mists or shifting lights. However, his works were usually less challenging or controversial than Turner’s. He painted English or Welsh landscapes from the neighbourhoods of Bala and other towns in Montgomeryshire, in Shropshire and around Southampton. His Lago Maggiore with a Thunderstorm was exhibited in 1802, and presents something of a conundrum, as there is no evidence that Calcott had ever been abroad till some years after the date of its exhibition. It is therefore assumed that the painting was worked up by Calcott from a sketch by another. He was elected ARA in 1806 and RA in 1810. His Diploma Work was the oil on canvas Morning (1810). Charles Lock Eastlake used to tell the story that Callcott said once to the painter David Wilkie: ‘Do you not know that every one complains of your continual rea-al-ly?’ Wilkie mused a moment, looked at Callcott, and drawled, ‘Do they rea-al-ly?’ ‘You must leave it off’ replied Calcott. ‘I  will, rea-al-ly’. ‘For heaven’s sake don’t keep repeating it’ said Callcott, ‘it annoys me’. Wilkie looked, smiled and in the most unconscious manner said ‘Rea-al-ly!’  In 1827 Calcott married Maria Graham (1786-1844), daughter of Admiral George Dundas and widow of Captain Thomas Graham, RN. She was a pioneer writer on early Italian art. They married on Calcott’s 48th birthday and set off on a year-long honeymoon to Italy, Germany, Austria and Bohemia. Sketches Calcott produced on the tour were later worked up into paintings, which he exhibited at the RA from 1833. One notable example was The Entrance to Pisa from Leghorn (1833: Tate). Calcott’s position in artistic society was acknowledged by his appointment to the Board of the Government Schools of Design in 1836 and he was knighted in 1837. The critic John Ruskin would damn Calcott with faint praise, observing that he: ‘painted everything tolerably, nothing excellently’. Calcott was appointed Conservator of the Royal Pictures in 1843. Sir Augustus died on 2 November 1844, at the age of 65 and was buried at Kensal Green Cemetery. His papers may be found at the Courtauld Institute of Art in London and the Bodleian Library at Oxford. Callcott’s portrait by Landseer may be found in the collection of the National Portrait Gallery.