Wilfred Williams Ball, 1853-1917
Nationality: English
Date of Birth: 4 January 1853
Place of Birth: London
Place of Death: Khartoum
Identity:
Wilfred Williams Ball was a London painter and etcher.
Life:
Ball was a painter of landscapes and marine subjects, working in both oil and watercolour. He was also an etcher. Many of his paintings and etchings were views of the Thames influenced by the works of JW. He exhibited between 1877 and 1903 at the Royal Academy (mainly etchings), Royal Society of Painter-Etchers and Engravers, Royal Institute of Painters in Water Colours, Fine Art Society, Dudley Gallery, Agnew and Sons Gallery, Leicester Gallery, Grosvenor Gallery, New Gallery and Society of British Artists, a society that elected JW its President in 1886. He was elected a member of the Royal Society of Painter-Etchers and Engravers in 1882 and of the Royal Society of British Artists in 1899. In October 1886 the society's financial difficulties were in part met by a lottery of JW's etchings to which Ball subscribed (#05276). He was also a member of The Arts Club from 1896 to 1916. He lived in Putney, but also travelled in Holland, Germany, Italy and Egypt.
Ball was among those proposed invitees to a dinner organised by W. C. Symons to congratulate JW on being made an Honorary Member of the Royal Academy of Munich, a dinner which was to be held at the Criterion in Piccadilly on 1 May 1889 (#05636).
Bibliography:
Wood, Christopher, Dictionary of Victorian Painters, Woodbridge, 1971; Johnson, J. and A. Gruetzner, Dictionary of British Artists 1880-1940, Woodbridge, 1980.