(1789 - 1843)
Nothing is known of the early life of William Thomas Fry. He was one of the first engravers to experiment with steel plates and encouraged dialogue on improving plate design. His stipple portrait of the Reverend William Naylor was one of the first engravings published using decarbonized steel plates designed by engraver Charles Warren. Fry also contributed to Rudolph Ackermann’s ‘Forget-me-not’ (1825), the first annual to use steel plates. He exhibited at the Society of Artists on Suffolk Street (1824-30) and produced eleven plates for the ‘National Gallery of Pictures of Great Masters’ (1836). Most of his works are portraits in stipple, but he also made aquatint and lithographic prints. He died, apparently unmarried, in London, aged c.54.
