Born in Dublin, the son of a cloth merchant, some time between 1728 and 1732, Barret began his career apprenticed to a staymaker.
By 1747  he had started learning to draw at Robert West’s academy at George’s Lane which was sponsored by Royal Dublin Society.
After completing his studies he taught drawing at the Academy.
He was a friend of Edmund Burke while Burke was an undergraduate at Trinity College, Dublin.
In 1757 Burke published A Philosophical Enquiry into the Origin of Our Ideas of the Sublime and Beautiful, and the influence of Burke’s thinking can be detected in some of Barret’s early paintings, such as the Powerscourt Waterfall.
A version of this painting in the Walker Art Gallery in Liverpool is said to have been painted for Edmund Burke.
Born in Dublin, the son of a cloth merchant, some time between 1728 and 1732, Barret began his career apprenticed to a staymaker. By 1747  he had started learning to draw at Robert West’s academy at George’s Lane which was sponsored by Royal Dublin Society. After completing his studies he taught drawing at the Academy. He was a friend of Edmund Burke while Burke was an undergraduate at Trinity College, Dublin. In 1757 Burke published A Philosophical Enquiry into the Origin of Our Ideas of the Sublime and Beautiful, and the influence of Burke’s thinking can be detected in some of Barret’s early paintings, such as the Powerscourt Waterfall. A version of this painting in the Walker Art Gallery in Liverpool is said to have been painted for Edmund Burke.
George Barret Sr.