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Yeats, John Butler

Biography: John Butler Yeats (1839 –1922 ) was an artist and illustrator. He, and his children, the poet William Butler Yeats, the embroiderer Susan Yeats, the printer and illustrator Elizabeth Corbet Yeats and the artist Jack B. Yeats, were leading figures in Irish cultural life from the later 1800s into the first half of the twentieth century. Whilst he trained to be a lawyer, John Butler Yeats turned to painting in the 1860s. He is most renowned for his portraits of leading Irish cultural figures, commissioned by Hugh Lane. He illustrated a number of works, including an edition of Daniel Defoe’s ‘Robinson Crusoe’ for Dent publishers in London (1895) and his son William’s text, ‘The Secret Rose’ (1897).