George Charles Williamson

“ He was a student at the Royal Academy in early youth, but only for a very short time. From the age of fourteen he was apprenticed to his father for seven years, and by means of his talent appears to have kept the family together. He had opportunities at this time of seeing some of the greatest artists of the day, and works by old masters, but even then a strange repugnance for educated society showed itself, and no persuasion, for example, could ever allure him within reach of the Angerstein gallery, where he would have been a welcome visitor. ”

“ At a very early age Morland produced sketches of remarkable promise, exhibiting some at the Royal Academy in 1773, when he was but ten years old, and continuing to exhibit at the Free Society in 1775 and 1776, and at the Society of Artists in 1777, and then sending again to the Royal Academy in 1778, 1779 and 1780. ”

“ His pictures of laundry-maids especially were very popular in their time, and were reproduced in mezzotint. They represented ladies of some importance who desired to be painted, according to the fashion of the day, engaged in domestic work. Morland’s mother was a Frenchwoman, who possessed a small independent property of her own; she is believed to have been the Maria Morland who exhibited twice at the Royal Academy in 1785 and 1786, although some writers have stated that Maria Morland was not the mother, but one of the sisters of George Morland. ”