Sir Henry George "Harry" Rushbury (October 28, 1889 – July 5, 1968) was an English

England

England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...

 painter

Painting

Painting is the practice of applying paint, pigment, color or other medium to a surface . The application of the medium is commonly applied to the base with a brush but other objects can be used. In art, the term painting describes both the act and the result of the action. However, painting is...

 and etcher

Etching

Etching is the process of using strong acid or mordant to cut into the unprotected parts of a metal surface to create a design in intaglio in the metal...

.

Born the son of a clerk in Harborne

Harborne

Harborne is an area three miles southwest from Birmingham city centre, England. It is a Birmingham City Council ward in the formal district and in the parliamentary constituency of Birmingham Edgbaston.- Geography :...

, then on the outskirts of Birmingham

Birmingham

Birmingham is a city and metropolitan borough in the West Midlands of England. It is the most populous British city outside the capital London, with a population of 1,036,900 , and lies at the heart of the West Midlands conurbation, the second most populous urban area in the United Kingdom with a...

, Rushbury studied on a scholarship under Robert Catterson Smith at the Birmingham School of Art

Birmingham School of Art

The Birmingham School of Art was a municipal art school based in the centre of Birmingham, England. Although the organisation was absorbed by Birmingham Polytechnic in 1971 and is now part of Birmingham City University's Birmingham Institute of Art and Design, its Grade I listed building on...

 from the age of thirteen. He worked as an assistant to Henry Payne

Henry Payne (artist)

Henry Arthur Payne RWS was an English stained glass artist, watercolourist and painter of frescoes.Payne was one of the Birmingham Group of Artist-Craftsmen who formed around Joseph Southall and the Birmingham School of Art in the late nineteenth century...

 until 1912, when he moved to London

London

London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...

, where he shared lodgings with fellow Birmingham student Gerald Brockhurst

Gerald Brockhurst

Gerald Leslie Brockhurst was an English painter and etcher.During the 1930s and 1940s he was celebrated as a portraitist, painting society figures such as Marlene Dietrich and the Duchess of Windsor...

.

Rushbury was an official war artist

War artist

A war artist depicts some aspect of war through art; this might be a pictorial record or it might commemorate how "war shapes lives." War artists have explored a visual and sensory dimension of war which is often absent in written histories or other accounts of warfare.- Definition and context:A...

 during World War I

World War I

World War I , which was predominantly called the World War or the Great War from its occurrence until 1939, and the First World War or World War I thereafter, was a major war centred in Europe that began on 28 July 1914 and lasted until 11 November 1918...

, and took up etching

Etching

Etching is the process of using strong acid or mordant to cut into the unprotected parts of a metal surface to create a design in intaglio in the metal...

 and drypoint

Drypoint

Drypoint is a printmaking technique of the intaglio family, in which an image is incised into a plate with a hard-pointed "needle" of sharp metal or diamond point. Traditionally the plate was copper, but now acetate, zinc, or plexiglas are also commonly used...

 under the influence of Francis Dodd

Francis Dodd

Francis Edgar Dodd RA was a notable British portrait and landscape artist and printmaker.Born in Holyhead, north Wales, the son of a Wesleyan minister, Dodd trained at the Glasgow School of Art, winning the Haldene Scholarship in 1893 and travelling around France, Italy and later Spain...

 before studying briefly under Henry Tonks

Henry Tonks

Henry Tonks, FRCS was a British draughtsman and painter of figure subjects, chiefly interiors, and a caricaturist...

 at the Slade School of Art in 1921.

He was elected a member of the New English Art Club

New English Art Club

The New English Art Club was founded in London in 1885 as an alternate venue to the Royal Academy.-History:Young English artists returning from studying art in Paris mounted the first exhibition of the New English Art Club in April 1886...

 in 1917, the Royal Society of Painter-Etchers in 1921, the Royal Society of Painters in Water Colours in 1922 and the Royal Academy

Royal Academy

The Royal Academy of Arts is an art institution based in Burlington House on Piccadilly, London. The Royal Academy of Arts has a unique position in being an independent, privately funded institution led by eminent artists and architects whose purpose is to promote the creation, enjoyment and...

 in 1936. In 1949 he was elected Keeper of the Royal Academy and Head of the Royal Academy Schools.