Kipling, John Lockwood

John Lockwood Kipling, C.I.E. (6 July 1837 – 26 January 1911) was an English art teacher, illustrator, museum curator, and father of author Rudyard Kipling. Kipling was born in Pickering, North Yorkshire, to Reverend Joseph Kipling and Frances Lockwood, and was educated at Woodhouse Grove School, a Methodist boarding school. He met his wife Alice MacDonald while working in Burslem, Staffordshire, where his designs can still be seen on the façade of the Wedgwood Institute. Alice was the daughter of a Methodist minister, the Reverend George Browne Macdonald. Kipling married in 1865 and moved with his wife to India, where he had been appointed as a professor of architectural sculpture in the Jeejeebhoy School of Art in Bombay (now Mumbai), and later became its principal. Their son was born soon after, in December 1865, and was christened Rudyard after Rudyard, Staffordshire, the place where his parents had first met; their daughter Alice Kipling was born in 1868. In 1870 Kipling had been commissioned by the government to tour the North-West Provinces and make a series of sketches of Indian craftsmen; today several of this sketches are at Victoria & Albert Museum.

In 1875, Kipling was appointed the Principal of Mayo School of Arts, Lahore, British India (present day National College of Arts, Pakistan) and also became curator of the Lahore Museum, which makes an appearance in Kim as the Wonder House, "Ajaib Ghar".

Kipling illustrated many of Rudyard Kipling's books, and other works, including Tales of the Punjab by Flora Annie Steel. He also worked on the decorations for the Victoria and Albert Museum in London and friezes on the Crawford Market in Bombay, and also designed the uniforms and decorations for Viceroy of India, Lord Lytton's Imperial Assemblage of 1877, at which Queen Victoria was proclaimed Empress of India. During his tenure as the Principal of the Mayo School of Art, Lahore he patronised indigenous artisans and through training and apprenticeship transformed them into craftsmen and designers. One of his protégés was Bhai Ram Sing, who assisted him in his imperial commission for decorating the Durbar Room at Osborne House. Kipling also remained editor of the Journal of Indian Art and Industry, which carried drawing works from the students of the Mayo School.

He died in 1911, and buried at in the parish of Tisbury, Wiltshire. (wikipedia, 2011-09-06)