JOHNSTONE, HENRY JAMES (British, 1835-1907)

Born in 1835 in Birmingham, he went to Melbourne in 1853, where he studied under Louis Buvelot and later at the Melbourne National Gallery School.
He was a member of the Victorian Academy of Arts and Society of British Artists.
Johnstone established a photographic business, Johnstone O’Shannessy & Co., as a means of earning a living.
He was described in the catalogue of the Intercontinental exhibition of 1875, as a ‘rising artist’.
He travelled extensively and in about 1880 he went to America and thence to London where he exhibited at the Royal Academy.
In his later years he specialised in small figure studies done in watercolours.