Biographies

William Strang (1859 – 1921) The painter, etcher, engraver and illustrator William Strang, was born in Dunbarton, Scotland. The son of a builder, he worked as a clerk before coming to London in 1876 to work at the Slade School, briefly under Poynter, and then for six years as pupil and then assistant to Legros. He was a lazy pupil, working only a couple of hours a day, until, after some two years, he was struck by the work of a contemporary student, H. S. Tuke, and decided to rival him in artistry. He painted, and from the beginning of the 1880s etched, becoming a founder member of the Royal Society of Painter-Etchers, and exhibiting his work at the Royal Academy. As an etcher, he was extremely prolific, carrying out 180 original etchings by the age of 30. At first much influenced by his master, Legros, later he was associated with Ricketts and Shannon, and worked for C. R. Ashbee’s Essex House Press. He became ARA in 1906 (as an engraver), and was elected RA in 1921, in which year he died suddenly. His work was very favorably reviewed in on February 1, 1908, . The New Age (NA 2.14:278)