Burnard, Robert (1800-1846?), painter and house painter, was born in Altarnun, Cornwall, son of Richard Parnell Burnard and Elizabeth, nee Westlake. He married Jane Chapman at Altarnun on 8 October 1822 and they had four children. His wife and eldest son died in 1831 and the following year Robert married Eliza, nee Stodden; they had ten children. The Burnard family came to South Australia in 1840 in the Java. They lived at Plympton, Adelaide, where Burnard worked as a house painter and painted still life pictures.

Burnard must have been dead by 1847 (although Statton states that he died on 13 April 1876). When his painting Fruit was shown in Adelaide's' first colonial art exhibition in 1847 the South Australian Register identified him with the late Colonel Light (q.v.), noting that their two paintings were 'not only beautiful in themselves, but to old colonists most valuable as relics of departed friends'. In such a context departure was permanent. However Robert Burnard's eldest surviving son, another Robert (q.v.), continued to produce exactly the same sorts of paintings and lived an apparently identical life to his father. Eliza Burnard outlived both Roberts, dying on 17 July at Bowden, South Australia; her youngest son, Richard, lived until 1940.

References:
J Statton, Biographical Index of South Australians 1836-1885, Adelaide 1986
South Australian Register, 13 February 1847

Agricultural and Horticultural Show
Exhibition of Pictures by Colonial Artists and Amateurs in the council chamber.

.......There are two which we must not pass by, although at the risk of unduly extending our notice. No. 6, "The ship Buckinghamshire" in Holdfast Bay, by Colonel Light, and 27, "Fruit", by Mr Burnard. these are not only beautiful in themsleves, but to old colonists most valuable as relics of departed friends.