Bonington, Richard Parkes (1802-1828) , English painter, born in Arnold, near Nottingham. He studied at the École des Beaux-Arts, Paris, and privately with Baron Antoine Jean Gros. Best known as a watercolorist, he spent much of his life in France and was one of the first painters in that country to adopt the techniques of English landscape painters of the period such as John Constable. After Bonington's death, his lyrical, atmospheric paintings strongly influenced the Barbizon school of painting in France. Included among his works are Henry IV and the Spanish Ambassador (1827?, Wallace Collection, London), Francis I and the Duchess d'Étampes (1828?, Louvre, Paris), and Coast Scene, Normandy and Roadside Halt (both in the Metropolitan Museum, New York City).