Brief Biography-Henry Raeburn was born in Edinburgh in 1756. His parents died when he was six, and as a teenager, his brother apprenticed him to a jeweller, during which time he painted miniatures. Raeburn spent a short time in the atelier of David Martin, a disciple of Allan Ramsay; other than that, Raeburn was mainly self-taught. However, after his marriage to a wealthy widow in 1780, he became a more proficient painter. In London, Joshua Reynolds influenced him greatly, and in 1784 he went to Italy for two years, where he encountered Pompeo Girolamo Batoni but did not procure much inspiration in Rome. Back in Edinburgh, Raeburn established himself as a successful portraitist. He was known to paint directly onto the canvas without doing drawings. In 1815 He was elected Royal Academician. King George IV knighted him in 1822 and named him King’s Limner for Scotland a year later.