Tom Nisbet (RHA), who died on May 12th, aged 91, was a painter best known for his watercolour views of Dublin and its surrounding landscape. He first exhibited works at the RHA's annual exhibition in 1935 and thereafter maintained an unbroken record, showing seven watercolours in this year's exhibition.
One of four brothers, Tom Nisbet was born in Belfast on December 16th, 1909, to Alexander and Annie Nisbet. His father repaired and tuned pianos and was a capable pianist with perfect pitch. Tom Nisbet was not formally educated beyond his early teens but, a keen reader, he built up a huge fund of general knowledge. Unable to settle down in Belfast, he came to Dublin in 1931. He worked as a van driver for Fletcher Phillipsons, transporting motor parts back and forth to the west of Ireland.
He had started painting at an early age and nurtured an ambition to be an artist. When he settled in Dublin he enrolled for evening classes at the Metropolitan School of Art, the precursor of today's National College of Art and Design, where he came into contact with and was, he said, well treated by Sean Keating and Maurice McGonigal.
He became friendly with many artists, including Lily Williams. During the war years he worked as a scene painter in the Theatre Royal. He married Kathleen Byrne in 1944 and the same year opened the Grafton Gallery in Harry Street. There he ran a framing workshop and mounted exhibitions, showing his own work, as well as work by other artists, including Arthur Armstrong, Bea Orpen and Colin Middleton, whose first Dublin exhibition was at the Grafton.
Close to McDaids pub, the gallery developed literary connections, and both John Ryan and J.P. Donleavy were exhibitors, while Brendan Behan, Patrick Kavanagh and Brian O'Nolan, all of whom he came to know, were regular visitors. When the building housing the Grafton Gallery was sold in 1971, he decided not to seek alternative premises but to base himself in the studio he had built in the garden of his home. Throughout the time he ran the gallery, he was out painting every weekend. Now he was free to paint daily, though he continued to frame his own work and, a keen conversationalist, was always ready to entertain visitors. His wife, Kathleen, died in 1973.
His only trip abroad was a visit to Paris in 1939. Otherwise he restricted his movements to within a tight circumference in and around Dublin where he found subjects for his painting: the Grand Canal, the reservoir at Blessington, Laragh, Annamoe, Dun Laoghaire and Howth harbours.
For many years, he was a regular correspondent to the letters page of The Irish Times, offering lively commentaries on topical subjects, and the Crosaire crossword was an unfailing part of his daily routine. A keen composer of limericks, his efforts were used in advertisements for the Irish Sweepstakes and Odearest mattresses. While he did not like television, he made an exception for coverage of boxing and snooker. He became an associate member of the RHA in 1954, and a full member in the 1960s. Besides the RHA annual exhibitions, he showed regularly with the Watercolour Society and The Dublin Painting and Sketching Club, as well as in numerous other group shows.
He is survived by his sons David and Richard, and by his brother Alec.
Tom Nisbet: born 1909; died, May 2001