Item #AT-0239- "Gipsy Girl with Tambourine " by Octavius Oakley (1800

Octavius Oakley was born in Bermondsey, London, April 27, 1800. He was the son of a London wool merchant. Originally Oakley was educated in medicine at the school of Dr. Nicholas at Ealing and was intended for the medical profession. This idea frustrated him so he was placed with a cloth manufacturer near Leeds. There he began to draw portraits of his acquaintances in pencil, and with many years of study and practice he decided to be a professional artist. About 1825 he settled in Derby England, where he continued painting portraits in watercolor. Here is was patronized by the Duke of Devonshire and other noblemen of the village. In the year 1841 he came to London. While in London in the year 1842 he was elected an associate, and in 1844 a member, of the Society of Painters in Watercolors, where he exhibited over 210 drawings of rustic figures, landscapes, and groups of "gipsies"( English slur for Romani people ), which earned for him the sobriquet of "Gipsy Oakley."