A fantastic rural farmyard scene featuring horses, pigs, goats, chickens, ducks and cattle by John Frederick Herring Jnr. In the foreground, pigs, goats and chickens are shown foraging for food whilst horses watch on. To the right, a bay horse drinks from a pond next to some ducks as cattle graze outside a barn. In the distance two figures can be seen walking along a country path towards a church.

John Frederick Herring was born in Doncaster c1820 to the artist John Frederick Herring (1795-1865) and his wife Anna Catharina (nee Harris) and was baptised on 2 May, 1821. There is some confusion about the date of his birth due to an earlier birth record existing for 21 June, 1815. To complicate matters further, all of the census records indicate he was born in 1816. Some sources suggest this was an earlier child who died and that Herring was the child born in 1820.

Herring’s brothers Charles Herring (1828-1856) and Benjamin Herring (1830-1871) also became artists. He and his brothers were exposed to art at an early age and were all tutored by their father whose subject matter influenced their work. The family moved to Newmarket during the early 1830’s and Herring would visit the racecourse to study the horses. The brothers would often collaborate with their father on paintings, however, Herring Jnr soon developed his own style and began painting farmyard and rustic scenes featuring horses and other farm animals. His emerging success caused some discord with his father, who from around 1836 began adding ‘SR’ or ‘Senr’ to his signature to avoid confusion between the two artists. Herring did not join his father when he later moved to London but at some point moved to Cambridgeshire where he met and married Emma Jane Dawson on 29 August, 1836. Together, they lived at Great Wilbraham with their 5 children.

By 1861, he had moved to nearby Fulbourn and continuing his successful career made his debut at the Royal Academy in 1863. He began exhibiting at the British Institution from 1864 and also exhibited at the Royal Society of British Artists at Suffolk Street.

After the death of his first wife, Herring married the artist Catherine Augusta Rolfe on 5 December 1865 at St Pauls Church, Hammersmith in London. Catherine (or Kate) was the sister of the artists Alexander Frederick Rolfe (1814-1875) and Henry Leonides Rolfe (1823-1881) and the daughter of William E Rolfe, a friend of his father. They lived at Wilbraham Road in Fulbourn, later moving to The Poplars in Fulbourn where Herring spent the rest of his life. He died at Fulbourn on 6 March 1907.

Examples of his work are held by a number of museums and public collections including the Bradford Museum, Hawarth Art Gallery, Government Art Collection, Grundy Art Gallery, the Tate, National Gallery of Art, Washington DC and the Watford Museum & Witt Library.

© Benton Fine Art