Aby Altson Altson

1. Aby'Farmer' Altson (1867-1949)

Aby Altson migrated to Australia from England to join his brother Barnett in 1883, and worked in his uncle's leather and saddlery business. He began art classes at the Gallery School of Design in 1886, and spent his leisure with members of the 'Heidelberg' painting school where he painted a number of small oil panels on cigar-lids from his brother's tobacconist shop.

In 1890 he on a travelling scholarship where he studied with Gustave Courtois and Pascal-Adolphe-Jean-Dagnan-Bouveret at the Academie Julian in Paris. He won a salon gold medal for his painting Echoin 1892, and from 1894-1898 worked in London as an illustrator for The Westminister Magazine. Between 1895 and 1936 he travelled frequently to India, and became the official portrait painter for several Indian maharajas. When he migrated to USA in 1937, he became a much sort after women's portrait painter. Among his best portraits is his prize winning 1889 portait of his sister-in-law, which is in the National Gallery of Victoria. His Flood Suffering in 1890 was acclaimed by critics as the best painting of that year.