John Moore (1821-1902) - Artist

John Moore (1821-1902) was the son of Martin Moore, a former mariner, and Elizabeth Warren who had married at St Mary’s Church in 1815.  There are conflicting accounts of John Moore's first employment but, given later events, it is likely that he was apprenticed in the trade of plumbing and sign-writing and that he starting painting as a hobby.

His early paintings appear to have been mainly landscapes so, although he was 31 years younger than Thomas Churchyard and George Rowe, he may have discussed painting with them.

Moore married Caroline Upson of Woodbridge in 1851 and three months later their son John Hordin was born.

Moore moved to Ipswich at around the age of thirty to thirty-five (about 1851 to 1856) where he worked for Jacob (Mules) Lucas of Orwell Place on decorative work such as wood-graining and sign-writing. Moore lived in Charles Street, later in George Street and then Tower Ramparts. His wife died in 1877 a year later he re-married, Harriet Kersey, at St Mary’s Church, Woodbridge.

From 1875 to 1901 he was an active exhibitor with the Ipswich Art Club and in 1880 he showed a record of seventeen paintings there.  By this time he specialised as a marine artist but he also produced several landscapes and topographical views of Ipswich.  He is reputed to have travelled in Scotland and the North on commissions for the Cobbold family and he also painted in North Norfolk and elsewhere.

Moore's second wife died in 1900 and after a few months we went to live at the home of his friend George Scolding in Mere Street, Diss, Norfolk.  Three days later he died aged 84 and was buried at Ipswich cemetery.

One account of Moore’s life states that he was a very quick worker, satisfying his mainly local middle-class patrons with pictures for their drawing-room walls.  A more flattering description can be found in the obituary published by the Ipswich Journal after he died in Diss in 1902.  It states that "in the rendering of boisterous seas and breakers he had no local superior and he could also hold his own in landscape painting. Thatched cottages, village commons, rural homesteads, winding rivers, wayside ponds etc., had for him a special attraction, and he always had an eye for the picturesque in whatever he submitted to canvas".

Some examples of his work are shown below.

These two oil on canvas paintings

are on display at the museum

Above,  Old Park Road, Ipswich, 1879.

Left, River Orwell from the Strand, Suffolk, 1883.

Both oil on canvas.

Northumberland Coast Scene  c 1877.

Oil on canvas    

Fishing Smacks off the East Coast 

Oil on Canvas         

Sources

Suffolk Artists 1750-1930, Chloe Bennett, Images Publications & Ipswich Borough Council.

Last edited  21 Aug 23