Boyce, George Price 1826 - 1897

George Price Boyce was born in London, England on 24 September 1826 and was articled to Thomas Little (1802-1859) in London until 1846. He was then an improver in the office of Thomas Henry Wyatt (1807-1880) and David Brandon (1812-1897) of Wyatt & Brandon from 1846 to c.1849. In 1848 he was elected an Associate of the Royal Institute of British Architect (ARIBA). Despite his training and having qualified as an architect, he appears to have abandoned a career in architecture in favour of painting. This was possibly the result of meeting the watercolourist David Cox at Betws-y-Coed in Wales in August 1849

In 1853 he began exhibiting paintings at the Royal Academy in London and in the 1861 England and Wales census he gave as his sole occupation Painter.

His early work showed the influence of Cox. By 1859 he had become a member of the Hogarth Club, which was primarily a meeting place of members Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood and their associates. He had previously participated in the exhibition of Pre-Raphaelite paintings held at Russell Place, London in 1857. About this time he began to exhibit at the Old Watercolour Society of which he was made an Associate in 1864 and a full member in 1878. He continued to exhibit most years at the OWS until 1890.

During the late 1850s Boyce spent periods of time travelling in France and Italy and in 1861-62 travelled to Egypt. He was a close friend of Dante Gabriel Rossetti and in 1863 he lived in rooms Chattam Place, Blackfriars, London which had previously been occupied by Rossetti. In 1870 he moved to West House in Chelsea, a house built for him by Philip Webb, and where he lived for the rest of his life. He died in London on 9 February 1897.