(British, b. 1942) William Bishop was born in 1942 and grew up in Portsmouth on the south coast of England. Much of his early years were spent rowing and sailing, both cruising and racing, and campaigning his own dinghies and keelboats in the Solent area.

As a boy he was continually fascinated by the parade of naval and merchant shipping passing to and from the Portsmouth and Southampton area as well as by the ever changing yachting scene; more especially when sailing aboard his father's yachts. From this exposure he began sketching ships and making small accurate models. Frequent visits to maritime museums sharpened his skills where he soon discovered the works of many great marine artists. Bill had always been much influenced by the works of W.L. Wyllie, 1851-1931, amongst others. Bill's parents happened to live next door to W.L.'s daughter Aileen, who passed on fifty of her father's oil brushes, which were then given to Bill.

His formal education was completed at the King's School, Canterbury, from 1950-59, and on leaving school, as the fourth generation of eldest sons, he was expected to go into the family shoe business where he remained for twenty-one years. In 1980 when the family business was sold on the retirement of his father, he took the chance to paint full time with support of his wife, Helen. Entirely self-taught he started his painting career solely with watercolors. Encouraged by Richard Joicey RSMA, he exhibited and sold works in the prestigious Royal Society of Marine Artists annual exhibitions from 1981-84, until demand for his work precluded his being able to spare work for exhibitions.

At this time, following the advice of several London galleries, he had been working up his ability in oils and shortly afterwards received a major commission from the Royal Naval Museum, Portsmouth, for a large oil to feature a depiction of "Windy Corner" at the Battle of Jutland. A commission followed this from the Mary Rose Trust to paint the Mary Rose Kind Henry VIII's warship, both in her recovery cradle from life in watercolor and also the definitive version of how she originally looked in oils. Further commissions included HMS Warrior for the Warrior Museum and John Cabot's ship Matthew of 1497 for the City of Bristol. The Matthew was painted from Colin Mudie's plans for the replica before the vessel was constructed. At his last showing at an R.S.M.A. annual exhibition one of his paintings was one of the half dozen chosen to illustrate a write-up on the exhibition in the National Maritime History of America's magazine "Sea History" (see Spring 1985).

Presently many of his works are in private collections in the USA, Australia, New Zealand, Singapore, South Africa, Oman, Gibraltar, West Germany, Jersey, The Falkland Islands and the UK He has produced two company calendars - in 1984, for the John Courage Brewery Co. and in 1985 for the Chichester Press.

Bill's work concentrates almost entirely on oil on canvas seascapes, with the now very occasional watercolor. When time allows, he maintains and races his own traditional wooded keelboat in the Solent, often with his wife or three sons as crew. His full-time pursuit is painting and the continuous search to find and master new techniques to improve his work.

William Bishop is exclusively represented by Quester Gallery.