Two Pointers on the Scent

Thomas Blinks ranks as one of the best known and most highly regarded British dog painters of the nineteenth century. Born at Mardston, his family soon moved to Ticehurst, Sussex, where the young Blinks went to school. He was sketching animals by the age of ten, and although he wanted to study art, his father insisted that he be apprenticed to a tailor. Although he did not receive any formal training, his keen observation and innate natural talent soon had him executing paintings of sporting life with an almost photographic quality.

He worked in both watercolour and oil although his best works were executed in the latter medium. He first exhibited at the Dudley Gallery in 1881 and at the Royal Academy in 1883. He exhibited twenty-nine works at the Royal Academy between 1883 and 1910.