Sandham was a historical, portrait, marine and landscape painter who made a living as an illustrator. He was born in Montreal, Quebec in 1842 and moved to Boston to pursue a career as a painter in 1881-1901. While in Boston he was closely associated with the leading painters of the era (Frank W. Benson, William Morris Hunt, John Joseph Enneking and others) and frequently visited the studios of A.T. Bricher and Winslow Homer, who highly influenced his artistic endeavors. 

While in the Boston area, Sandham learned to paint in a fine academic manner and he concentrated on figural compositions in which people did daily chores. In Low Tide at Marry Bay, 1884, the artist shows children playing along the Canadian shoreline while elders sit and knit, talk and watch them nearby.

In 1901 Sandham moved to London, where he changed his palette to that of an Impressionist but his most desirable works predate 1900. He lived in England as an expatriate until his death in 1912.

Sandham studied with O.R. Jacobi and J.A. Frazer and was a charter member of the Royal Canadian Academy in 1879. He also was a member of the Boston Art Club and exhibited at the Philadelphia Centennial Exposition (1876, medal) and in London (1886, medal), Boston (1881, medal of honor), Boston Art Club (1881-1901), National Academy (1881, 1894); Pennsylvania Academy of Art (Philadelphia, 1881, 1890-1898, 1901); Brooklyn Art Association (1884) and that the Paris Salon, the Royal Academy (London), World’s Columbian Exposition (1893) and the Art Institute of Chicago. 

The artist is represented in the permanent collections of the National Gallery of Canada; Lexington Town Hall; Parliament Buildings in Ottawa and elsewhere. He was primarily known as a figure painter in landscape and was an illustrator for Picturesque Canada (1882); Century (1883); Lenore by Poe (1886); “Ramona” by H.H. Jackson (1886) and more.

References:  Who’s Who in American Art (through 1906); Who’s Was Who in American Art (volume 3, p. 2886-2887)