Rabbit Shooting

Henry John Boddington was the second son of Edward Williams. He did not attend school and received teaching from his father in whose studio he worked from childhood. In 1832 he married Clarissa Eliza Boddington, and like his two brothers, Sidney Richard Percy and Arthur Gilbert, he adoped his wife's maiden name to avoid confusion with other family members. Although he struggled for a few years in considerable poverty, he later became a very prosperous artist. His earliest paintings depicted the scenery of Surrey and the banks of the Thames. In the 1840s he travelled extensively through the British Isles to Devon, the Lake District, Yorkshire, Scotland and North Wales sketching quiet country life. The works of this period are noted by the broadness of his technique which was quite unlike his later period, where he became more detailed in his powers of description. He particularly studied light and shade and paid attention to the play of light seen as a pattern against the beech and elm trees, which form so important a part of his compositions and which are evident in the present picture.