Brian Bradshaw profile
| Name: | Brian Bradshaw |
| Year of Birth: | 1923 |
| Year of Death: | |
| Country: |
- Oil on board (1)
Bradshaw aws born in Bolton, Lancashire in 1923. He went to the Bolton School of Art and Manchester Regional Collage of Art. After World War II demobilisation in 1948, he won a Royal Scholarship to the Royal Collage of Art, London.
His first solo show was held at Salford City Art Gallery in 1953. Since then he has held numerous one-man exhibitions in the UK, USA, South Africa, Australia and Zimbabwe, including four retrospectives.
In 1955 Bradshaw was appointed Vice Chairman of the British Parliamentary Committee on Art Education and continued in his post until 1960 when he was invited to South Africa to take the Chair of Fine Arts at Rhodes University. His influence on the work of his students was remarkable and a new style of painting emerged from the Eastern Cape. In 1964 he formed the 'Grahamstown Group' exhibiting in their own gallery in Grahamstown and throughout South Africa and Rhodesia. He resigned from Rhodes University and the Directorship of the National Galleries of Rhodesia in 1978 and returned for a while to the UK. Many of his students are now well known South Africa artists, heads of art departments, university professors and directors of galleries.
Bradshaw now commutes between the north of England and South Africa exhibiting in both places. He is mostly concerned with the expression of indigenous and the energetic and mineral patterns that emanate from the African bush and desert.
