ADRIAN HEATH

Adrian Heath Biography

Adrian Heath 1920-1992

Adrian Heath was a private pupil under Stanhope Forbes at Newlyn and went on to study at the Slade. During the Second World War, Heath met Terry Frost in a Bavarian prisoner-of-war camp and it was there that Heath inspired Frost to paint. After the war, Heath spent six months with Frost in St. Ives. Heath was to become the main link between the St. Ives School and the London based 'Constructionists' (Mary and Kenneth Martin, Victor Pasmore and Anthony Hill).

Between 1951 and 1953, Heath held exhibitions in his studio at 22 Fitzroy Street. The third exhibition included William Scott, Roger Hilton and Frost. The art critique Lawrency Alloway saw these artistic groupings as a new development in modern painting and in 1954 he published Nine Abstract Artists which celebrated the advancement of abstract painting in works by Heath and his associates.

Selected Solo Exhibitions:

Musée des Beaux-Arts, Carcassone, France, 1948

Redfern Gallery, London, regularly from 1953

Lords Gallery, London, 1957

De Unga Gallery, Stockholm, 1959

Konstforening, Goteborg, 1959

Hanover Gallery, London, between 1959-62

Museum am Ostwall, Dortmund, 1961

Retrospective Exhibition, City Art Gallery, Bristol (toured to Sheffield), 1971-72

Retrospective Exhibition, Camden Arts Centre, London, 1975

Kettle's Yard Gallery, Cambridge, 1976

Compass Gallery, Glasgow, 1981

British Council Tour of Norway, 1984

Austin Desmond Fine Art, 1990

Selected Group Exhibitions:

This is Tomorrow, Whitechapel Gallery, London, 1956

Fourth International Exhibition of Contemporary Art, Tokyo, 1958

Pittsburgh International Exhibition, 1961

54:64 Painting and Sculpture of a Decade, Gulbenkian Foundation, Tate Gallery, London, 1964

British Painting 74, Hayward Gallery, London, 1974

British Painting 1952-77, Royal Academy of Arts, London, 1977

English Contrasts 1950-60, Artcurial, Paris, 1984

Recalling the Fifties, Serpentine Gallery, London, 1985

St Ives 1939-64, Tate Gallery, London, 1985

Adrian Heath, Graham Sutherland, Arte Fiera '87, Bologna, 1987

The British Art Show, North Bay Arts Centre, Ontario, Canada, 1991

Accolades:

Chairman of Artist's International Association, 1955-64

Lecturer, Bath Academy of Art, 1955-76; University of Reading, 1980-5

Artist in Residence, University of Sussex

Senior Fellow, Glamorgan Institute of Higher Education, 1977-80

Panel member, Arts Council, 1964-7

Selected Collections:

Arts Council of Great Britain

The British Museum

Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation

Contemporary Art Society

Tate Gallery, London

The Victoria and Albert Museum
City of Bristol Museum and Art Gallery
Carlisle Museum and Art Gallery
Glasgow, Art Gallery and Museum
Leicestershire Museum and Art Gallery
University of Manchester, Whitworth Art Gallery
University of Newcastle, The Hatton Gallery
University of East Anglia, Norwich, Sainsbury Centre for Visual Arts
Arts Council of Northern Ireland
Sheffield, Graves Art Gallery
Southampton City Art Gallery
Victoria Art Gallery, Bath
Melbourne, National Gallery of Victoria, Australia
Bergen, Billedgalleri, Norway
Port Elizabeth, King George VI Art Gallery, South Africa
Goteborgs Konstmuseum, Goteborg, Sweden
Dortmund, Museum am Ostwall, Germany
Boston, Museum of Fine Arts, USA
New York, The Brooklyn Museum, USA
Washington DC, Hirschhorn Museum, USA