Noel Armstrong Forster (15 June 1932 – 7 December 2007) was a British artist who trained at
King's College Newcastle
Newcastle usually refers to:
*Newcastle upon Tyne, a city and metropolitan borough in Tyne and Wear, England, United Kingdom
*Newcastle-under-Lyme, a town in Staffordshire, England, United Kingdom
*Newcastle, New South Wales, a metropolitan area ...
a part of
Durham University
Durham University (legally the University of Durham) is a collegiate university, collegiate public university, public research university in Durham, England, founded by an Act of Parliament (UK), Act of Parliament in 1832 and incorporated by r ...
, graduating in 1957.
Forster was born in
Seaton Delaval
Seaton Delaval is a village and former civil parish, now in the parish of Seaton Valley, in Northumberland, England, with a population of 4,371. The largest of the five villages in Seaton Valley, it is the site of Seaton Delaval Hall, comple ...
,
Northumberland
Northumberland ( ) is a ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in North East England, on the Anglo-Scottish border, border with Scotland. It is bordered by the North Sea to the east, Tyne and Wear and County Durham to the south, Cumb ...
and attended to
Gosforth Grammar School.
He married Eileen Conlon in 1962, later having three sons with her. In due course he became Principal lecturer in Painting at the Chelsea College of Art & Design in
Chelsea as well as Artist-in-Residence and Supernumerary Fellow at
Balliol College
Balliol College () is a constituent college of the University of Oxford. Founded in 1263 by nobleman John I de Balliol, it has a claim to be the oldest college in Oxford and the English-speaking world.
With a governing body of a master and ar ...
Oxford University
The University of Oxford is a collegiate research university in Oxford, England. There is evidence of teaching as early as 1096, making it the oldest university in the English-speaking world and the second-oldest continuously operating u ...
. In 1978 he won the
John Moores Painting Prize His art can best be described as abstract, colourful and usually involving a cross-weaved fabric of straight or curved parallel lines drawn by hand, often executed in oil on linen. He died in
London
London is the Capital city, capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of both England and the United Kingdom, with a population of in . London metropolitan area, Its wider metropolitan area is the largest in Wester ...
.
"Noel was in my view the most important post-War abstract painter in England, and his work combined performance, intellectual rigour and the artist's craft. It was simultaneously clever and sensuous. He was an influential teacher too and a very gifted musician. But he was also larger than life.
Stephen Bury, Curator, British Library, 8 December 2007
/blockquote>
"Noel was a splendid friend, and a wonderful painter.He thought endlessly about the relations of paint and light, and talked with extraordinary clarity - and complexity - about making works of art. He taught me a lot about looking.The ideas behind his own work were intricate and uncompromising."
http://www.noelforster.co.uk AS Byatt, Author, Dec 2007
"Noel Forster was an adventurous and productive artist whose glowing, audacious personality looked out from his canvasses.
Obituary in ''The Times'', 17 January 2008
Bernard Cohen, Artist, Dec 2007
References
External links
Chris Yetton, ''Noel Forster: Artist who believed that painting is the 'concretisation of light' (obituary), '' The Independent, 2 January 2008
Noel Forster official website
Detailed Profile at Flowers
Obituary in ''The Times'', 17 January 2008
1932 births
2007 deaths
English modern painters
20th-century English painters
English male painters
21st-century English painters
21st-century English male artists
People from Seaton Delaval
British abstract artists
People educated at Gosforth Academy
Academics of Camberwell College of Arts
Alumni of King's College, Newcastle
20th-century English male artists
John Moores Painting Prize winners
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