Charles Lamb was a landscape, portrait and figure painter. He was born in 1893 in Portadown, Co Armagh and he was the eldest son of a Northern Ireland painter and decorator. He studied life-drawing at Belfast School of Art. In 1917 he won a scholarship to the Metropolitan School of Art in Dublin where he studied for four years and came under the influence of Sean Keating.

In 1919 he had four works selected for the RHA and he continued to exhibit there regularly, missing only a few years until his death, averaging more than four works per show.

In 1922 he set out for Connemara, ‘settled’ in Carraoe, a remote Irish-speaking distinct in Co. Galway, and thereafter painted landscapes and many figure subjects connected with life in the West of Ireland.

The winter of 1938-9 found Lamb in Germany. As from 1941, he began to spend more time painting on the Bann river and particularly in Rostevor, Co. Down, holding exhibitions in Belfast and Portadown.