Michael Simpson (born 1940) is a British painter. Simpson has had major solo shows at the Serpentine (1985), the Arnolfini (1996), Spike Island (2016), BlainSouthern (2017) and Stuart Shave Modern Art (2024), and in 2016 won the John Moores Painting Prize for his painting ''Squint (19)''.

Career

Born in

Dorset Dorset ( ; Archaism, archaically: Dorsetshire , ) is a Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in South West England. It is bordered by Somerset to the north-west, Wiltshire to the north and the north-east, Hampshire to the east, t ...

to Anglo-Russian parents, he attended Bournemouth College of Art (1958–60) and the

Royal College of Art The Royal College of Art (RCA) is a public university, public research university in London, United Kingdom, with campuses in South Kensington, Battersea and White City, London, White City. It is the only entirely postgraduate art and design uni ...

(1960–63). Simpson makes large-scale paintings in ongoing series. These often repeat and rework several subjects and elements. Simpson's influences include early Flemish painting, and his painting style incorporates minimalism and other types of formal restraints. He describes his approach to painting as a "deceptive force of the constructed image." In Vitamin P3, a guide to contemporary painting, critic Barry Schwabsky described Simpson's 'allegiance to a conception more readily associated with abstraction than with painting that employs images'. He goes on to describe the artist's preoccupation with "the idea that painting is not a kind of imaginary opening in the wall through which we get an illusory view of another world, but rather a physical thing that is made, whose flat surface confronts the viewer with a presence that demands engagement." Simpson has lectured in several British Art Schools and Universities and featured in various documentaries, including "Odyssey of a Painter" (Louisiana Channel Documentary). "I believe a painting must move beyond its subject, and formal considerations are paramount in my work. I try to 'build' a painting, and by putting its elements together in a certain way, I hope to find those critical relationships which will give the object its brevity and coherence. Like an unpredictable marriage, this challenging process between abstract principles and the subject's subliminal forces remains the essence of the practice". – Michael Simpson, November 2023 Stuart Shave Modern Art, London represents him He currently lives and works in

Bradford on Avon Bradford-on-Avon (sometimes Bradford on Avon) is a town and civil parish in west Wiltshire, England, near the border with Somerset. The town's canal, historic buildings, shops, pubs and restaurants make it popular with tourists. The parish had ...

Wiltshire Wiltshire (; abbreviated to Wilts) is a ceremonial county in South West England. It borders Gloucestershire to the north, Oxfordshire to the north-east, Berkshire to the east, Hampshire to the south-east, Dorset to the south, and Somerset to ...

National collections

* Tate (London, England) * Louisiana Museum of Modern Art (Copenhagen) * British Council (England) * Arts Council (England) * David Roberts Collection (London) * Ekard Collection (Netherlands)

Awards

* John Moores (2016) * Winner of the London Arts Foundation Fellowship (1999) * John Moores 17 (1991) * Tolly Cobbald Open (1977)

External links

Michael Simpson homepage

Michael Simpson at David Risley Gallery

Michael Simpson at Blain Southern

Notes and references

{{DEFAULTSORT:Simpson, Michael 1940 births Living people 20th-century British painters 21st-century British painters Alumni of the Royal College of Art Alumni of Arts University Bournemouth Artists from Dorset English contemporary artists English people of Russian descent John Moores Painting Prize winners