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Robert Sargent Austin

English engraver and draftsman, 1895–1973

BiographyRobert Sargent Austin RE RWS RA, (1895- 1973) artist, illustrator, engraver and currency designer. Studied at Leicester Municipal School of Art (1909 -1913) followed by the Royal College of Art, London until the outbreak of WWI. He returned to the College in 1919, studying etching under Sir Frank Short. Between 1920 and 1930 he produced etchings from copper plates worked in very fine detail in an almost Pre-Raphaelite style. During WWII Austin worked as a war artist recording the efforts of women in the Royal Air Force and in the nursing services for the War Artists' Advisory Committee. After the war, he taught at the Royal College of Art as Professor of. Austin was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of Painter-Etchers and Engravers (R.E.) in 1927 and was elected President from 1962 to 1979. He was elected a full member of the Royal Watercolour Society (R.W.S.) in 1934 and served as President from 1957 to 1973. He was elected an Associate of the Royal Academy in 1939 and to the full membership (R.A.) in 1949 as an engraver.

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