Richard Barrett Talbot Kelly

Richard Barrett Talbot Kelly MBE, MC, RI, (20 August 1896 – 30 March 1971), known to friends and colleagues as 'TK', was a British army officer, school teacher, and artist, known especially for his watercolour paintings of ornithological subjects.

Early life Talbot Kelly was born in Birkenhead, then part of Cheshire, England, on 20 August 1896. He was the only son of Lilias Fisher Kelly and Robert Talbot Kelly. He was educated at The Hall School, Hampstead, followed by a boarding school in Rottingdean, then Rugby School and finally the Royal Military Academy, Woolwich. He served as a Forward Observation Officer with the 9th (Scottish) Division, 52nd Brigade, Royal Field Artillery, in France, from May 1915 until January 1917. He saw combat in the Battle of Loos (1915), the Battle of the Somme (1916) and the Battle of Arras (1917). He was wounded by the blast from a shell at the Battle of Passchendaele on 5 August 1917. ) in 1924, he was discharged from the army in 1929. ), and was Chief Instructor at the War Office Camouflage Development and Training Centre in Farnham for the duration of the war. a rank he retained until discharge. For his work at Farnham he was appointed, in the 1944 New Year Honours, a Member of the Order of the British Empire (MBE).

He painted posters for British Rail, London Underground, and London Transport.

He was engaged as the design consultant for the Pavilion of Natural Science at the 1951 Festival of Britain. A copy of his 1927 poster for the Underground Electric Railways Company of London, "Zoo: Common and Spiny Lobster", is in the collection of the Art Institute of Chicago. A copy of his poster for British Railways, "Norfolk – Heron & Bearded Tits", and one of his 1960 London Transport poster "When did you last see your Ravens?" are in the Science Museum, London.

His daughter is the ornithological artist Chloe Elizabeth Talbot Kelly, His son Richard Giles Talbot Kelly (1929–2006 ) was also an artist.

Publications

Illustrated by Talbot Kelly