Richard Burchett

Richard Burchett (1815 – 27 May 1875) was a British artist and educator on the fringes of the Pre-Raphaelite movement, who was for over twenty years the Headmaster of what later became the Royal College of Art. He was later described as "a prominent figure in the art-schools, a well-instructed painter, and a teacher exceptionally equipped with all the learning of his craft" by his ex-pupil, the poet Austin Dobson. Burchett's pupils included the extremely varied talents of Kate Greenaway, Christopher Dresser, Elizabeth Thompson (Lady Butler), Sir George Clausen, Sir Luke Fildes, Gertrude Jekyll, Hubert von Herkomer, Evelyn De Morgan, William Harbutt, Henrietta Montalba, and Helen Allingham.

Princess Louise, Duchess of Argyll, Queen Victoria's daughter, and a talented artist, was also a student. Thompson described her headmaster as a "bearded, velvet-skull-capped and cold-searching-eyed man". As an artist he achieved some reputation for large history paintings, and decorated public buildings including parts of the Palace of Westminster and the Victoria and Albert Museum, but his View across Sandown Bay, Isle of Wight is seen by modern art historians as his best work.

Burchett published collections of his lectures as text-books for the South Kensington system of art education, which he helped to devise.