Lilian Lucy Davidson ARHA, WCSI (1893-1954)

The landscape, portrait and genre painter Lilian Davidson was born in Bray, County Wicklow.

She studied at the National College of Art & Design, and began exhibiting with the Water Colour Society of Ireland when she was 19. From then until a year before her death she never missed an exhibition.

In 1914, Lilian began showing at the Royal Hibernian Academy (RHA), contributing over 130 paintings in forty years. She was elected an associate member in 1940. She also exhibited with Munster Fine Art Club and the Dublin Painters Group.

Mountain Sheep

Lilian Davidson met many of her contempories, including Mainie Jellet with whom she held a joint exhibition in 1920, and Bea Orpen and Kitty Wilmer O'Brien both of whom she taught at her studio in Earlsfort Terrace, Dublin.

Among her portrait subjects, were Jack B. Yeats, Sarah Purser, 'AE' George Russell, Austin Clarke and Joseph Holloway.

During her career as a painter, she taught in several art schools and lived and worked in a number of countries such as France, Belgium and Switzerland.

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By 1936, she had exhibited her artworks (both oils and water colours) in a number of European and American cities, including: Paris, London, Amsterdam and Chicago.

In 2003, her painting "Fashions At The Fair" fetched €44,000 - a new record for a work by Lillian Davidson.

More Information About Visual Arts in Ireland

• For details of other painters and sculptors from Wicklow, see: Irish Artists: Paintings and Biographies.
• For more about fine art in Ireland, see: Irish Art Guide.

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