19th-20th Century, British
An engraver and painter, Ernest Stephen Lumsden taught himself from the technical manual by the French printmaker Maxime Lalanne (Bordeaux, 1827-1889) and in 1903, during a stay in Paris, he attended the Académie Julian art school.
Lumsden soon gained a reputation as an etcher, and in 1906 he exhibited some of his works at the Société des peintres-graveurs and later at the Paris Salon.
In 1908 he moved to Edinburgh, where he was appointed university lecturer at the Edinburgh College of Art. The following year he was elected a member of the Royal Society of Painter-Etchers.
A tireless traveller, Lumsden journeyed throughout several continents and countries, from Canada to Spain, from Japan, Korea and China to Burma or India, in those days still a British colony. Fascinated by India, he visited the country several times from 1912 through 1927. It was precisely in India where he discovered the scenes and subject matters that truly enthralled and inspired him. However, unlike many of his predecessors, Lumsden resisted the temptation of exoticism, and in his views and oriental subjects he eschewed the exotic and picturesque approach characteristic of Romanticism.
In 1923 he was appointed a member of the Royal Scottish Academy and from 1929 to 1947, he was president of the Society of Artist Printers.
In 1925 Lumsden published The Art of , a comprehensive manual about the techniques of that discipline which would become a key source for its study. He was also the author of the article on engraving for the fourteenth edition of the Encyclopaedia Britannica.
Around 1927, the printmaking market experienced a downturn, forcing Lumsden to look towards painting, focusing mostly on portraiture and landscape. As a painter he took part in a group show at the New Gallery of Edinburgh.
Between 1905 and 1946 he created 350 etchings, most of them currently at the Burnaby Art Gallery, British Columbia, Canada.
Although his works are treasured by some of the world’s major museums including the Tate, British Museum, Victoria and Albert Museum, Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art, Fitzwilliam Museum, and the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts, Lumsden has not enjoyed the prestige and the in-depth research his work merits