The brother of the watercolour landscape painter Elizabeth PETRIE, Graham Petrie was widely travelled. He was also an active exhibitor, showing in London at the Royal Academy, Royal Institute of Oil Painters, Royal Institute of Painters in Water Colours, Fine Art Society, Dowdeswell Galleries, Grosvenor Gallery, New Gallery, New English Art Club and Society of British Artists, a society that appointed James Abbot McNeil WHISTLER its President in 1886.

Petrie was among those invited to attend a dinner organised by William Christian SYMONDS to congratulate Whistler on being made an Honorary Member of the Royal Academy of Munich, a dinner held at the Criterion in Piccadilly on 1 May 1889. [Whistler Studies, Glasgow]

Notice of his visit to St Ives is in 1914.