Alfred Downing Fripp (22 April 1822 – 13 March 1895) was an English painter who specialised in watercolours of rural genre figures. He was grandson of the marine artist Nicholas Pocock, a brother of the painter George Arthur Fripp, and father of the surgeon Sir Alfred Downing Fripp.
Fripp was born in Bristol and studied at the Royal Academy of Arts. He held his first exhibition in 1842, his initial works featuring Irish and Welsh peasants in landscape settings. In 1844 he became an associate of the Old Watercolour Society, progressing to full membership in 1846, and ultimately becoming its secretary from 1870 onward.Mallalieu, Huon, The Dictionary of British watercolour artists up to 1920, Volume I A-L, 3rd edition, p. 258, 2002, Woodbridge, Suffolk: Antique Collectors' Club, , 2nd edition on the Internet Archive
Following the death of his first wife in 1850, he spent four years in Italy, where he became friends in Rome with Frederick Leighton and Edward Poynter. During this period his subjects became Italian, mostly studies of young peasants.Wood, Christopher, The Dictionary of Victorian Painters ("Research by Christopher Newall"), p. 165, 2nd edn. 1978, Antique Collectors' Club, London On his return in 1854 he reverted to painting British subjects.Mallalieu, Huon, The Dictionary of British watercolour artists up to 1920, Volume I A-L, 3rd edition, p. 258, 2002, Woodbridge, Suffolk: Antique Collectors' Club, , 2nd edition on the Internet Archive After a second, briefer, Italian visit in 1859 he married Eliza Banister Roe. He had a particular interest in Dorset scenery around Lulworth. Many of Eliza's younger siblings were models for his paintings including "the Fisher Boy". He died, aged 72, in London.
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Francis Greenacre, "Fripp, George Arthur (1813–1896)", Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, 2004 accessed 13 June 2007 Obituary, The Times, London, Saturday, 16 March 1895, p. 12