John Craxton

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John Craxton (born October 3, 1922 in London , † November 17, 2009 ibid) was an English painter.

Life

The son of the composer and pianist Harold Craxton and brother of the oboist Janet Craxton began studying at the Académie de la Grande Chaumière in 1939 , but this was interrupted by the beginning of the Second World War. He then studied in London at Westminster Art School and Goldsmiths College , where he met the painter Lucian Freud of the same age and the elder Graham Sutherland , who painted with him in Pembrokeshire from 1943-44.

In 1944 Craxton had his first major solo exhibition in the Leicester Galleries and was commissioned to illustrate the poetry collection The Poet's Eye , compiled by Geoffrey Grigson , for which he created 16 lithographs. After the war he traveled to Paris (where he met Pablo Picasso ) and Switzerland and worked with Freud on Poros in Greece from 1946–47 .

In 1951 he was commissioned by Frederick Ashton to design the costumes and sets for his choreography for the ballet Daphnis and Chloë at Covent Garden Opera (with Margot Fonteyn and Michael Somes ). For a performance by the Royal Ballet for Ashton's 100th birthday in 2004, he reconstructed the now lost designs from memory. He designed another costume and stage design for a performance of Igor Stravinski's Apollo at the Royal Opera House in 1968.

After a joint exhibition with Freud at E. L. T. Mesens ' London Gallery , Craxton had numerous solo exhibitions in the 1950s and 1960s, including six at the Leicester Galleries and a retrospective in 1967 at the Whitechapel Art Gallery . From 1960 he lived in Chania , Crete, but returned regularly to his family home in London. In 1993 he was elected to the Royal Academy of Arts .

Craxton primarily emerged as a landscape and portrait painter. Stylistically, he was influenced by Byzantine painting and landscape painting of the 19th century as well as by contemporary Cubism , his older friend Sutherland and the Greek painter Nicolas Ghika . Craxton's works can be found in the collections of the Scottish National Gallery in Edinburgh, the Britten-Pears Foundation in Aldeburgh and the Royal Academy of Arts, the National Portrait Gallery and the Tate Gallery in London.

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personal data
SURNAME Craxton, John
BRIEF DESCRIPTION English painter
DATE OF BIRTH October 3, 1922
PLACE OF BIRTH London
DATE OF DEATH November 17, 2009
Place of death London