thumb|Portrait of John Varley by [[William Mulready, 1814]]

thumb|Portrait of John Varley by [[John Linnell (painter)|John Linnell, 1820]]

thumb|Hackney Church by John Varley

thumb|right|The Straits of Gibraltar

John Varley (17 August 177817 November 1842) was an English watercolour painter and astrologer, and a close friend of William Blake. They collaborated in 1819–1820 on the book Visionary Heads, written by Varley and illustrated by Blake. He was the elder brother of a family of artists: Cornelius Varley, William Fleetwood Varley, and Elizabeth, who married the painter William Mulready.

Life and work

John Varley was born at the Old Blue Post Tavern, Hackney, on 17 August 1778. His father, Richard Varley, born at Epworth in Lincolnshire, had settled in London after the death of his first wife in Yorkshire. His mother was an alleged descendant of the regicide Oliver Cromwell through the marriage of his daughter, Bridget, and the Parliamentarian soldier and politician General Charles Fleetwood. Varley's parents discouraged his leanings towards art, and placed him under a silversmith. But on their death he was for a brief time employed by a portrait painter in Holborn and then, at the age of 15 or 16, he became a pupil of Joseph Charles Barrow (fl. 1789–1802) who had an evening drawing school twice a week at 12 Furnival's Inn Court, Holborn. It was Barrow who took Varley on a sketching tour to Peterborough from which he emerged as a professional painter. In 1798 he exhibited a highly regarded sketch of Peterborough Cathedral at the Royal Academy and became a regular exhibitor at the RA until the foundation of the Old Watercolour Society in 1805.

Works

  • J Varley's List of Colours, published by John Varley, London 1818, 1pp.
  • A Treatise on the Principles of Landscape Drawing...
  • A Practical Tratise on the Art of Drawing in Perspective: adapted for the study of those who draw from nature; by which the usual errors can be avoided (printed for Sherwood, Gilbert, and Piper,...and R. Ackermann, ..., London ?1815/1820?).
  • A Treatise on Zodiacal Physiognomy, illustrated by engravings of heads and features, and accompanied by tables of the time of rising of the twelve signs of the zodiac; and containing also new and astrological explanations of some remarkable portions of ancient mythological history (published for the author, 10½, Great Tichfield Street, London 1828; sold by Longman) IV, 60pp.: 6 Plates, (8vo), 25 cm; plates engraved by J. Linnell.

According to the Encyclopædia Britannica Eleventh Edition, "Varley's landscapes are graceful and solemn in feeling, and simple and broad in treatment, being worked with a full brush and pure fresh transparent tints, usually without any admixture of body-colour. Though his works are rather mannered and conventional, they are well considered and excellent in composition. Some of his earlier water-colours, including his "Views of the Thames," were painted upon the spot, and possess greater individuality than his later productions, which are mainly compositions of mountain and lake scenery, produced without direct reference to nature."