John Wycliffe Lowes Forster
Canadian, 1850 – 1938
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J. W. L. Forster or, more formally, John Wycliffe Lowes Forster was a Canadian artist specializing in portraits. Many of his works can be found at the National Gallery of Canada. Career In Toronto in 1869, he started his art education as a student of portrait painter John Wesley Bridgman (1833–1902). For his portrait of Bridgman, he won first place in the amateur division at the Upper Canada Agricultural Society's annual fair in 1871.
In 1879 Forster studied for three months at the South Kensington Art School in London with Canadian landscape painter Charles Stuart Millard (1837-1917). After that, he attended the Académie Julian in Paris, studying with Jules Joseph Lefebvre and Gustave Boulanger (1880-1882); Tony Robert-Fleury and William-Adolphe Bouguereau; and later, with Carolus Duran. He returned to Toronto in 1883 and was elected an associate member of the Royal Canadian Academy of Arts. Among his writings are 2 volumes of autobiography and a survey of early Ontario artists.