George Coates, Melbourne-born artist, started his art career in a stained glass workshop, attending classes with Frederick McCubbin at the National Gallery school at night. Proving an outstanding draughtsman, he was soon teaching his own classes in Swanston Street, his students including Norman Lindsay, Max Meldrum and George Bell. In 1895-1896 he studied under L Bernard Hall, and he won a travelling scholarship to London in 1896. In Paris in 1898 his paintings were exhibited on the line at the Old Salon, and he renewed an acquaintance with Dora Meeson, who became his wife. They lived for many years in London, where he became an associate of the Royal Academy, a member of the Chelsea Arts Club and one of the city's pre-eminent portrait painters. In company with many other expatriates, he served during the war at the Third London General Hospital; on his discharge, he painted many commissions for the Australian War Memorial. Coates and Meeson returned to Australia in the early 1920s, but he died in London, having become a Member of the Royal Academy in 1927.
