User:JMChap/sandbox

Mike Elliott
Born	Michael Frederick James Elliott (1933-01-19)19 January 1933 St. Thomas' Hospital, London, England
Died	29 January 1999(1999-01-29) (aged 66) University College Hospital, London
Resting place	Boston Cemetery, Boston, Lincolnshire
Education	Camberwell College of Arts Slade School of Fine Art
Known for	Painting, teaching, printmaking
Notable work	Terror of the Awakened Child, City Landscape
Movement	Constructivism, German Expressionism
Spouse	Robina Evans ​ (m. 1957)​
Children	3
Elected	Member of The London Group

Michael James Elliott (19 January, 1933 - 29 January 1999) was an English abstract artist, painter, teacher, printmaker, and London Group member. He worked as a lecturer at the Camberwell School of Arts and Crafts.

Early Life

Elliott was born in Clapham, London, England, and was the eldest of the two children of Frederick James Elliott and Doris Alice Lucy née Batch . During the Second World War, he was sent to a primary school in Norfolk. He came from a poor, working-class family, and after returning to their home in Tooting, at the end of the war, he was granted funding to attend [?] Grammar School. It was here, at age 16, that he decided that he wanted to paint. As a result of his background, his father was not so accommodating of his aspirations, but he managed to convince him by speaking in terms of commercial art.

Terror of the Awakened Child, 1955 (UCL Art Museum)

After leaving secondary school, he was granted funding from the London County Council (LCC) to attend Camberwell School of Arts and Crafts. He graduated, after four years, with both an Intermediate Certificate in Arts and Crafts and a National Diploma in Design (NDD). With further financial support from the LCC, he continued his education, having been accepted into the Slade School of Fine Art. There, he studied painting, and design, under Sir William Coldstream and Robert Medley. His time at the Slade was a very productive one; he exhibited his piece, Dead Bird, at The Exhibition of the Royal Academy of Arts 1954, and would go on to exhibit work in several group exhibitions including the 1956 Young Contemporaries exhibition at the RBA Gallery on Suffolk Street, which was delayed until the following year; and then subsequently, the 1957 Six Young Contemporaries exhibition at Gimpel Fils. His piece Terror of the Awakened Child won joint first prize in the school's 1955 Summer Composition competition, alongside Margaret Evans' Interior with Figures. His 1956 piece, City Landscape (The Rink, Streatham), was purchased by King's College, University of Durham, on behalf of their professor Sir Lawrence Gowing, who had taken a liking to it during a visit to the Slade. It was also here that he would meet fellow student and life-long partner Robina Evans (1936 - 1991), whom he would marry after graduating in 1957.

Early Career

Elliott's copy of the poster for the exhibition of The First 15 Years of Art Madí

After graduating from the Slade, he received a post-graduate scholarship to continue his studies, and a grant from the French government to go to Paris, where he and his newly-wed wife spent the year working. Not much is known of his time there; however, it was during this period that he would come into contact with the Argentinian concretist group, Madí, introducing himself and his work to them at the 1958 Art Madí International show at the Gallerie Denise René, and then exhibiting work with them when the exhibition was later shown at the Witcomb Galleries in Buenos Aires. He was considered one of the international members of the movement.

When the two returned home to London, he established a studio at 295 Kennington Road, around which the group KO-5 was formed. The group, as the name suggests, consisted of five artists working towards a common, constructivist vision. It was here that Elliott conceived the idea of creating group works, which he called Serigraphies en Commun (joint screen prints). These works involved getting all members to participate in moving different forms around the page. These ‘forms’ were pieces of black card, cut, usually, into long rectangular strips of varying length and width; the group would take it in turns moving the pieces into position until they all agreed on a composition; at which point, it would be burned into a silk-screen and printed onto a surface. Elliott had wrote that KO-5 displayed some of these prints at the Gallerie Denise René, in 1959, but no evidence of this has, so far, been found. The group would continue working closely with Madí, exhibiting with them once again at the First 15 Years of Art Madí exhibition at the Museo Moderno, in Buenos Aires, in 1961.

two of Mike Elliott's serigraphs (left side) on display at the London Group's 1963 exhibition, alongside work by other artists

After a chance encounter with the painter and teacher, Joe Dixon, in 1958, Elliott managed to secure himself a part-time teaching position at Camberwell, where he would spend the next forty years working, until his death. His time at Camberwell started in the general drawing class where he taught draughtsmanship skills to foundation students. During his tenure at the school, he took part in lessons in all manner of subjects, including: drawing, painting, basic design, screen printing for textiles and graphics, printmaking, papermaking, collage costume, and set production. He spent the majority of his time as a lecturer in the textiles department under friend, and head of department, Theo Mendez; here, in the 1970s, he was responsible for organising the North Peckham Estate Murals, which have been used as an example of the school's dedication to serving its local community.

In 1963, alongside the contemporary art-scene giants, David Hockney, Sir Frank Bowling, and Leon Kossoff, Elliott was elected a member of The London Group, exhibiting work alongside them in that year’s exhibition at the RBA's Suffolk Street Galleries. The exhibition featured three of his solo KO-5 screen prints, which were done on mounted hardboard and framed using aluminium strips; a technique that was representative of his constructivist style, and one that he would continue to use for much of his larger works. During the 1963 Annual General Meeting of the London Group, Elliott was elected as a member of the selection committee, being responsible for the selection of non-member works for the 1914-64 Jubilee Exhibition at the Tate Gallery, after a suggestion was made by Morris Kestelman, to hand letters to members who were also teachers, so that they could encourage students to put forward their work for submission.

Later Life

In 1964, Elliott, his wife, son and newly-born daughter moved from London to Chilworth, Surrey. This decision saw a major shift in the amount of work he was able to create. There's no evidence to suggest that he displayed work in any exhibitions during his almost 10 years spent there. One thing that did happen during this intermezzo period, was a distinct shift in his style. The paintings that do exist, mostly consist of uncharacteristic figurative landscapes, depicting his garden; and his sketches reflect a deeper interest in architecture, which may have come from an increased responsibility to mend and build things around the house. This shift seems to have impacted his work for the remainder of his life, as he would never return to the purist, constructive style, completely.

In 1973, he and his family, now with the addition of his second son, moved to Old Leake, Lincolnshire. He seemed to have retained an interest in landscapes, as during this period, he would create a number of postcards of the countryside surrounding his new home. These prints utilised linocut techniques, which he printed on top of painted card. This series of work appears to have been inspired, in part, by the work of Gainsborough-born artist, Karl Salsbury Wood, as two albums containing prints of his, were found in Elliott's possession.

During the 70s, He became heavily interested in German expressionism, and in 1975, he set the major task for the first year students at Camberwell, which revolved around this very movement This was the revitalisation of his artistic pursuit, as he combined elements of his constructivist past, with the style and vibrance of the expressionists. He created an inconceivable amount of these constructive-expressionist pieces, most of which were relatively small, and consisted of collages and screen prints on paper. It was a new realm in which he could experiment, and it led to some of his best, large-scale paintings, including Paris '82 , AY-LABA, and Night Walk.

Self Portrait, 1989

In 1980, he worked with the Anti-Taptoe Committee; a Dutch demonstration group in Breda, who had begun protesting the arrival of the annual National Military Tattoo, in 1976. He created a series of collage-serigraphs, entitled Breda '80, which featured an ensemble, mainly of sections of the poster from that year's protest, but also included imagery of Chilean dictator, Augusto Pinochet, Cuban singer, Celia Cruz, as well as bits of anti-fascist symbology; screen-printed atop a collage of Dutch newsprint publications, including pages and adverts from the local communist outlet, De Waarheid. The prints, though unique, greatly resemble the propaganda posters of the 20th Century fascist and communist regimes. A later set of work would be created, entitled, Peace or Pieces, which were re-muddled sections of the original prints, combined with added geometric elements, which were printed again on an abstract coloured background. This highlights Elliott's attitudes towards his work during this period; a piece was never finished until there were no more feasible compositions left to be created. His Breda prints are some of his best and most impactful small-form work.