William Hoare (1707-1792)

Born near Eye, Suffolk in 1707, eldest of the three children of John Hoare, a prosperous farmer and land agent. The family soon moved to Berkshire and William was sent to school at Faringdon where he showed an early talent for drawing. His father was persuaded to send him to London in the early 1720's, where he joined the studio of Giuseppe Grisoni (1699-1769), an Italian who had come to England in 1718. When Grisoni returned to Rome in 1728, he took Hoare with him and where Hoare shared lodgings with artist Peter Angelis (1785-1734) and sculptors Laurent Delvaux (1696-1778) and Peter Scheemakers (1691-1781), at 53 via Gregoriana. He joined the studio of Francesco Fernandi, called Imp...