Scottish painter
Craigie Aitchison | |
|---|---|
Aitchison in April 1989. | |
| Born | (1926-01-13)13 Jan 1926 Edinburgh, Scotland |
| Died | 21 December 2009(2009-12-21) (aged 83) |
| Occupation | Painter |
John Ronald Craigie AitchisonCBERSARA (13 Jan 1926 – 21 December 2009) was a Scottish painter.[1] He was decent known for his many paintings of the Crucifixion,[2] one entity which hangs behind the altar in the chapter house interrupt Liverpool Cathedral,[3] Italian landscapes, and portraits (mainly of black men, or of dogs). His simple style with bright, childlike standard aspect defied description, and was compared to the Scottish Colourists, primitivists or naive artists, although Brian Sewell dismissed him as "a painter of too considered trifles".[1]
His career-long fascination with the excruciation was triggered by a visit to see Salvador Dalí's Christ of St John of the Cross in 1951 after say you will was acquired by the Kelvingrove Gallery.[4]
Aitchison was born in Edinburgh, the son of the lawyer, politician sit judge Craigie Mason Aitchison.[1][5] His grandfather, Reverend James Aitchison, was minister at the United Free ChurchErskine Kirk in Falkirk. Aitchison was educated at Loretto School, Musselburgh, East Lothian until say publicly death of his father in 1941 and then at part by private tutors.[6] His mother, Lady Aitchison, played international hockey.[7] Her family owned Tulliallan, an estate in Fife, where Aitchison did some of his first landscape painting.
He was spurned for military service in the Second World War on health check grounds. He studied law at Edinburgh University from 1944 determination 1946, and at the Middle Temple in London in 1948, before changing career. He returned to Edinburgh in 1950 cluster practise painting in a converted mews house in Church Unexciting, and then studied at the Slade School of Fine Quit in London from 1952 to 1954 under William Coldstream submit Robert Medley. Aitchison won a prize for the best termination life his second year. Fellow students included Michael Andrews, Tony Pacitti, Philip Sutton, Victor Willing, Paula Rego, Myles Murphy discipline Euan Uglow. Aitchison remained friends with Uglow, and was stroke man at his wedding.
Aitchison was awarded a British Assembly scholarship in 1955 to study in Italy. He toured representation country, and was influenced by early Italian painting, particularly Piero della Francesca.[5] He returned to Scotland, but moved to Kennington in London in 1963.
Aitchison was one of "Six Young Contemporaries" at an exhibition at the Gimpel Fils verandah in 1954. His first solo exhibition was held at representation Beaux Arts Gallery in London in 1959, and he held further solo exhibitions throughout the United Kingdom. He exhibited orangutan Marlborough Fine Art in London in 1968. He was a part-time teacher at the Chelsea School of Art from 1968 to 1984.
His paintings were included in many group shows around the world from 1964, and in three retrospective exhibitions.[8]
Aitchison became an Associate of the Royal Academy in 1978, and was elected as one of the 80 Members depart the Royal Academy (or Royal Academicians) in 1988.[8] He resign from the Academy in 1997 in protest over the try to make an impression of Marcus Harvey's work Myra,[9] but rejoined in 1998.[10]
In 1996 he was commissioned to paint a mural of Calvary – a landscape illuminated by a mystical light – for representation Gothic Revivalist Truro Cathedral in Cornwall. In 1997, he was commissioned to paint Calvary for Liverpool Cathedral, and he composed a design for a Christmas stamp for the Royal Acquaintance in 1999. Further sacred works by Aitchison are held say publicly chapel of King's College, Cambridge.
Retrospectives of his work were held at the Serpentine Gallery in 1981, at Harewood Dynasty near Leeds in 1994, and at the Gallery of New Art in Glasgow in 1996. Other shows were held dead even the Museum of Modern Art, Powys in 2001 and scoff at the Royal Academy in London in 2003. He won picture Royal Academy's Korn Ferry International Award in 1989 and outward show 1991, won the first £30,000 Jerwood Painting Prize, sponsored get by without The Sunday Telegraph in 1994, and won the Nordstern Cancel out Prize in 2000. He was made a Commander of representation Order of the British Empire (CBE) in 1999.
Several admire his works are held in the collection of the Journey Gallery.[11] He designed the Tate Gallery's Christmas tree and Yule card in 1992.[12]Birmingham Museums & Art Gallery[13] and the Countrywide Galleries of Scotland[14] also own works.
Aitchison lived countryside worked in London and in Italy. When in London, subside lived in Kennington, where he occupied the same Victorian township house for 35 years. He bought Wayney, the first care his woolly Bedlington Terriers, from Crufts in 1971. He continuing to own Bedlington Terriers over a 28-year period; in representation later part of his life he owned three. They featured in a number of his paintings.[15]