Alistair Grant, Modern British Surrealist Abstract Bold Color Aquatint Etching Print Yellow Eye, c.1960's

Description

Alistair Grant was a familiar feature of the London art scene. Best known as a printmaker, his entire teaching career … more Alistair Grant was a familiar feature of the London art scene. Best known as a printmaker, his entire teaching career was spent in the printmaking department at the Royal College of Art, where he was to become Professor. Over the years he taught printmaking to many who were to become leading UK artists. Grant was at the top of his profession and a groundbreaker in his explorations of mixed media techniques. Grant was also a wonderful painter. In the early 1980s his imagery had turned to an open expressionist style, with sweeping brush marks and the introduction of new vibrant colour.
Inspired by the Normandy coastline around Etaples and Le Touquet. Grant would create cyphers from the shapes and forms in the landscape, which he would offset against curtains of colour.
They evoke bright or misty days, blazing skies or sunsets, beaches or harbours. The paintings and prints are descriptions of places he loved and constantly returned to. One could describe him as a French reflection of the St. Ives School where painters explored the landscape in similar fashion, as they still do. There is a wonderful sense of freedom in these images, and a great joie de vivre.
Grant was a supreme colourist. He also co-authored an important book on the life and works of fellow English artist Henry Moore, whom his abstract figurative style resembles. This print is from the late 1960s and show the strong influence of figurative abstraction and surrealist elements in his work. Although best known as a printmaker, Grant also painted throughout his career and in the 1980s he adopted an expressionist style using vibrant colours. He was born in London and studied at Birmingham College of Art (1941-43). After serving during the war, Grant returned to art school and the Royal College, where he was taught by Carel Weight and Ruskin Spear. Grant was to work in the printmaking department of the Royal College for 35 years (1955-90), ending his career as Emeritus Professor of Printmaking at the RA. He showed with Julian Trevelyan.
Grant showed at the Royal Academy, Artists International Association, and New English Art Club, and was a prize-winner at the Krakow Print Biennale in 1972. The TATE, The Victoria & Albert Museum, British provincial and many overseas galleries hold Grant’s work. His work is amongst the finest of modern British printmaking alongside richard smith, joe tilson, peter blake, patrick caulfield, alan davie, terry frost, david hockney and howard hodgkin.

Select Group Exhibits
1951 New Editions Group,Auckland,New Zealand
1952-54,78 Redfern Gallery, London
80,83,84,86
1956 Nutida Engelsk Grofik, Stockholm
1957 National Arts Council of Southern Rhodesia
'Looking at People', South London Art gallery
1959 Tel Aviv Museum, Israel
Arte Britonico Maderno Figurotiro,
Galeria,Buchloz, Bogota
The London Group
1960 Graven Image, Whitechopel Gallery, London
Sixteen Pointers, A I.A. Gallery, London
1961 Museo de Arte, Barcelona
Senfelder Group, Arts Council, London
1962 Towards Art Gulbenkian,R.C.A .London
Contemporary British Pointers, Birmingham
1964-66 Curwen Gallery
1966 Crabowski Gallery, London
1967 A.A.A. Gallery, New York
Schuman Gallery, New York
1968 Camden Arts Centre, London
1969 Pratt Centre, New York
Art for lndustry, Arts Council, London
1970 University of South Florida, Miami
1971 Portland Museum,Oregon
1972 Art Gallery of Ontario, Toronto, Canada
1976 R.C.A.Printmakers,Waddington Gallery,London
1988 'Exhibition Road',R.C.A,London
1989 Berkeley Square Gallery, London
1989,90 Austin Desmond Gallery, london
1990 Scottish Gallery, London
1991 Big Little Picture-Show,W.Jackson,London
1992 'Winter Seen III',W.Jackson Gallery,London
1993 1 st Egyptian Print Triennale, Giza, Egypt
1994 Art '94, london, with Art First
La Galerie du Touquet (with Alain Morcot)
1995 Art '95, London, with Art First
1996 Art '96, London, with Art First
New Academy Gallery, london
1997 Art '97, london, with Art First
3 Years On', Art. First, London less