Oliver Bevan
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Oliver Bevan (born 28 March 1941) is an English artist, who was born in
Peterborough Peterborough ( ) is a City status in the United Kingdom, cathedral city in the City of Peterborough district in the Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county of Cambridgeshire, England. The city is north of London, on the River Nene. A ...
and educated at
Eton College Eton College ( ) is a Public school (United Kingdom), public school providing boarding school, boarding education for boys aged 13–18, in the small town of Eton, Berkshire, Eton, in Berkshire, in the United Kingdom. It has educated Prime Mini ...
. After leaving school he spent a year in 1959–60 working for
Voluntary Service Overseas VSO is a not-for-profit international development organization charity with a vision for "a fair world for everyone" and a mission to "create lasting change through volunteering". VSO delivers development impact through a blended volunteer model c ...
in
British North Borneo North Borneo (usually known as British North Borneo, also known as the State of North Borneo) was a British protectorate in the northern part of the island of Borneo, (present-day Sabah). The territory of North Borneo was originally establish ...
before returning to London to study painting at 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 ...
, where he became strongly influenced by
Op Art Op art, short for optical art, is a style of visual art that uses distorted or manipulated geometrical patterns, often to create optical illusions. It began in the early 20th century, and was especially popular from the 1960s on, the term "Op ...
and in particular the work of
Victor Vasarely Victor Vasarely (; born Győző Vásárhelyi, ; 9 April 1906 – 15 March 1997) was a Hungarian-French artist, who is widely accepted as a "grandfather" and leader of the Op art movement. His work titled ''Zebra'', created in 1937, i ...
. Bevan graduated from the RCA in 1964 and had his first exhibition of Op Art-inspired paintings the following year. Optical, geometric and kinetic art then served him well until the late 1970s when he moved to the Canadian prairies for a two-year teaching post at the
University of Saskatchewan The University of Saskatchewan (U of S, or USask) is a Universities in Canada, Canadian public university, public research university, founded on March 19, 1907, and located on the east side of the South Saskatchewan River in Saskatoon, Saskatch ...
. By the time he returned to London in 1979 he had abandoned
abstract art Abstract art uses visual language of shape, form, color and line to create a Composition (visual arts), composition which may exist with a degree of independence from visual references in the world. ''Abstract art'', ''non-figurative art'', ''non- ...
in favour of
figurative art Figurative art, sometimes written as figurativism, describes artwork (particularly paintings and sculptures) that is clearly derived from real object sources and so is, by definition, representational. The term is often in contrast to abstract a ...
and urban realism.


Optical, geometric and kinetic art

Bevan's first solo exhibition at the
Grabowski Gallery The Grabowski Gallery was an avant-garde art gallery opened in 1959 in London's Chelsea, London, Chelsea by Mateusz Grabowski, anticipating the Swinging Sixties. It hosted some of the earliest shows of the rising pop art movement and was the firs ...
, London, in 1965 featured eight Op Art paintings with hard edges and colour fields in black, white and shades of grey, plus red and blue in ''Both Ways 1'' and ''2''. The paintings were based on isometric projections of a cube and played on the viewer's visual perception through tonal flicker, figure-ground reversals and other optical ambiguities which Bevan described as 'a conflict between the certainty of the geometry and the uncertainty of the perceptual mechanism in dealing with it', adding that the paintings are 'clues to what might be possible'. The exhibition attracted favourable reviews from critics such as John Dunbar,
Norbert Lynton Norbert Casper Lynton (22 September 1927 – 30 October 2007, Brighton, England ) was Professor of the History of Art at the University of Sussex. From 1998 - 2006 he was Chairman of the Charleston Farmhouse, Charleston Trust. He has publ ...
and Guy Brett, with Brett concluding that it 'achieves its aim of intensifying our awareness of our perceptual processes, which implies our awareness of the visible world'. A second exhibition of ten new paintings at the Grabowski Gallery in 1967 introduced
shaped canvas Shaped canvases are paintings that depart from the normal flat, rectangular configuration. Canvases may be shaped by altering their outline, while retaining their flatness. An ancient, traditional example is the '' tondo'', a painting on a round pa ...
es and a larger colour palette to further 'provoke the viewer into an active relationship with the work'. This concept of viewer participation – whereby each person brings their own perceptual interpretation to the paintings and thus contributes to the creative process – was made tangible in a third exhibition at the Grabowski Gallery in 1969. This featured seventeen new works, including a tabletop piece consisting of sixteen square tiles which were each divided diagonally into two of four colours and could be rearranged by the viewer to create different combinations of figure and ground. Bevan then developed the idea further, using six magnetic tiles on a square steel sheet that was covered with black canvas and could be hung on the wall like a painting. This new work, ''Connections'', was shown at the
Institute of Contemporary Arts The Institute of Contemporary Arts (ICA) is an modernism, artistic and cultural centre on The Mall (London), The Mall in London, just off Trafalgar Square. Located within Nash House, part of Carlton House Terrace, near the Duke of York Steps a ...
in 1969–70 as part of ''Play Orbit'', an exhibition of artworks that visitors could interact or 'play' with in the manner of toys and games. Meanwhile, a chance visit to the Grabowski exhibition by John Constable, the Art Director at Fontana Books, led to a commission for Bevan to create the cover paintings for the first twenty titles in a series on vanguard thinkers and theorists called the
Fontana Modern Masters The Fontana Modern Masters was a series of pocket guides on writers, philosophers, and other thinkers and theorists who shaped the intellectual landscape of the twentieth century. The first five titles were published on 12 January 1970 by Fontana ...
. For this Bevan drew directly on his ''Connections'' piece, creating two sets of geometric cover designs that the reader could arrange as 'tiles' in a larger artwork. The books were published in 1970–73, by which time Bevan had also collaborated with the composers Brian Dennis and Grahame Dudley on a production at the
Cockpit Theatre The Cockpit was a theatre in London, operating from 1616 to around 1665. It was the first theatre to be located near Drury Lane. After damage in 1617, it was named The Phoenix. History The original building was an actual cockpit; that is, a s ...
of Dennis's ''Z'Noc'', a thirty-minute experimental piece in which the musicians take their cues from a constantly changing display of abstract colours, shapes and shadows that Bevan created by projecting light onto three mobiles. This led Bevan to experiment with Polaroid as a medium for other types of
kinetic art Kinetic art is art from any medium that contains movement perceivable by the viewer or that depends on motion for its effects. Canvas paintings that extend the viewer's perspective of the artwork and incorporate multidimensional movement are ...
, and in 1973 he produced the first of his
lightbox A lightbox is a translucent surface illuminated from behind, used for situations where a shape laid upon the surface needs to be seen with high contrast. Types Several varieties exist, depending on their purpose: * Various backlit viewing device ...
es using polarising filters and fluorescent tubes, with more complex versions employing electric motors and sets of slowly rotating discs. These lightboxes became the canvases for 'chromatropic paintings' which, as Bevan explained, enable 'colours to be selected in time as well as space', resulting in a mesmerising display of changing colours and shifting shapes as forms dissolved and reappeared. Between 1974 and 1978 Bevan's chromatropic or 'time' paintings were exhibited in London, Zurich, Detroit and Toronto, with pieces such as ''Turning World'', ''Crescendo'', ''Sunspot'' and ''Co-Incidence'' (now in the
Government Art Collection The Government Art Collection (GAC) is the collection of artworks owned by the UK government and administered by the Department for Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS). The GAC's artworks are used to decorate major government buildings in the UK and ...
) winning plaudits from
Ernst Gombrich Sir Ernst Hans Josef Gombrich (; ; 30 March 1909 – 3 November 2001) was an Austrian-born art historian who, after settling in England in 1936, became a naturalised British citizen in 1947 and spent most of his working life in the United Ki ...
and others. Eight 'points' in the cycle of his ''Pyramid'' chromatrope were also used as Fontana Modern Masters covers, with the back of each book offering the following explanation: 'The painting is made of transparent materials which only assume colours when illuminated by polarised light. If the plane of polarisation is rotated slowly, which happens mechanically in a box designed to display the painting, the colours pass through a recurring cycle of change'.


Figurative art and urban realism

On returning to London from Canada in 1979, Bevan rented a top-floor studio near
Smithfield Market Smithfield, properly known as West Smithfield, is a district located in Central London, part of Farringdon Without, the most westerly Wards of the City of London, ward of the City of London, England. Smithfield is home to a number of City in ...
in Farringdon and became 'a painter of modern life', citing Manet,
Degas Edgar Degas (, ; born Hilaire-Germain-Edgar De Gas, ; 19 July 183427 September 1917) was a French people, French Impressionism, Impressionist artist famous for his pastel drawings and oil paintings. Degas also produced bronze sculptures, Print ...
and Sickert as influences along with the urban realism of
New Objectivity The New Objectivity (in ) was a movement in German art that arose during the 1920s as a reaction against German Expressionism, expressionism. The term was coined by Gustav Friedrich Hartlaub, the director of the ''Kunsthalle Mannheim, Kunsthalle' ...
('Neue Sachlichkeit') in Germany and
Edward Hopper Edward Hopper (July 22, 1882 – May 15, 1967) was an American realism painter and printmaker. He is one of America's most renowned artists and known for his skill in depicting modern American life and landscapes. Born in Nyack, New York, to a ...
and the
Ashcan School The Ashcan School, also called the Ash Can School, was an artistic movement in the United States during the late 19th-early 20th century that produced works portraying scenes of daily life in New York, often in the city's poorer neighborhoods. T ...
in New York. Bevan's subject was the area around his studio and scenes from everyday life such as people in cars, on buses, crossing streets and, later, supermarket interiors. Solo exhibitions of his Farringdon paintings at two London galleries in 1981 and 1984 were followed by two at the
Barbican Centre The Barbican Centre is a performing arts centre in the Barbican Estate of the City of London, England, and the largest of its kind in Europe. The centre hosts classical and contemporary music concerts, theatre performances, film screenings a ...
in 1986 and 1993. The latter presented Bevan's paintings of the Westway flyover, an elevated dual carriageway in west London that had captivated him when his car broke down and was towed to a garage in the sunless and somewhat alienating space between the road's concrete stanchions. According to the writer
Will Self William Woodard Self (born 26 September 1961) is an English writer, journalist, political commentator and broadcaster. He has written 11 novels, five collections of shorter fiction, three novellas and nine collections of non-fiction writing. Se ...
, Bevan 'was entranced by the shapes the flyover's decks described and embarked on a series of large-scale canvases that elegantly capture the strange dichotomies the road represents: its beauty and its terror, its light and its darkness'. During this period, Bevan also organised, curated and participated in two group exhibitions of urban paintings (''The Subjective City'' in 1989–90 and ''Witnesses & Dreamers'' in 1993–94) which toured to public art galleries around the UK. A solo exhibition, ''Urban Mirror'', at the
Royal National Theatre The National Theatre (NT), officially the Royal National Theatre and sometimes referred to in international contexts as the National Theatre of Great Britain, is a performing arts venue and associated theatre company located in London, England, ...
in 1997 continued his exploration of the painted city, with the writer
Peter Ackroyd Peter Ackroyd (born 5 October 1949) is an English biographer, novelist and critic with a specialist interest in the history and culture of London. For his novels about English history and culture and his biographies of, among others, William ...
comparing Bevan's work to that of ' Auerbach and Kossoff, who have a genuine painterly reverence for the real features of the streets and the people. In that sense he can claim a spiritual affinity with the line of London painters which stretches back as far as
William Hogarth William Hogarth (; 10 November 1697 – 26 October 1764) was an English painter, engraving, engraver, pictorial social satire, satirist, editorial cartoonist and occasional writer on art. His work ranges from Realism (visual arts), realistic p ...
'. A second solo exhibition at the Royal National Theatre five years later presented a series of paintings that focused on a particular microcosm of urban life. The subject had presented itself in 1994, when Bevan moved to a new studio in disused classrooms at Wendell Park Primary School in west London. Walking to and from his studio each day, he became increasingly intrigued by the behaviour of the children in the playground, as he later explained: 'In zoological terms they are 'wild' for half an hour. This contrast between adult and child behaviour struck me more and more forcibly. While we, the adults, are fastidious about the space around our own bodies, only touching one another as a deliberate communication, the children are in continuous physical contact, holding hands, wrestling or skipping in pairs. The girls prefer more socialised games, forming groups to dance, skip or clap while the boys race, fight and kick footballs. My own childhood was unlike most of this, which is perhaps why I am so drawn to celebrate their physical energy, and cultural diversity ..... The children understood what I was doing and were excited to see themselves in the paintings'. A selection of Bevan's urban paintings in public and corporate collections are as follows: * ''Westway Triptych'', 1987, now in the collection of the
Museum of London London Museum (known from 1976 to 2024 as the Museum of London) is a museum in London, covering the history of the city from prehistoric to modern times, with a particular focus on social history. The Museum of London was formed in 1976 by ama ...
. * ''Hanging On'', 1989, now in the collection of Middlesbrough Art Gallery. * ''Apron'', 1990, a series of four paintings commissioned by the
British Airports Authority Heathrow Airport Holdings is a company that operates and manages Heathrow Airport based in London, England. It was formed by the privatisation of the British Airports Authority as BAA plc as part of Margaret Thatcher's privatisation of governme ...
for
Gatwick Airport Gatwick Airport , also known as London Gatwick Airport (), is the Airports of London, secondary international airport serving London, West Sussex and Surrey. It is located near Crawley in West Sussex, south of Central London. In 2024, Gatwic ...
. * ''A drink before the show'', 1994, commissioned by
Art on the Underground Art on the Underground, previously called ''Platform for Art'', is Transport for London's (TfL) contemporary public art programme. It commissions permanent and temporary artworks for London Underground, as well as commissioning artists to create ...
and now in the collection of the
London Transport Museum The London Transport Museum (LTM) is a transport museum based in Covent Garden, London. The museum predominantly hosts exhibits relating to the heritage of Transport in London, London's transport, as well as conserving and explaining the histo ...
. * ''Walk'', 1995, now in the collection of the
Guildhall Art Gallery The Guildhall Art Gallery houses the art collection of the City of London, England. The museum is located in the Moorgate area of the City of London. It is a stone building in a semi-Gothic style intended to be sympathetic to the historic Guil ...
, London. * ''Balance'', 1998, now in the collection of the
Herbert Art Gallery and Museum Herbert Art Gallery & Museum (also known as the Herbert) is a museum, art gallery, records archive, learning centre, media studio and creative arts facility on Jordan Well, Coventry, England. Overview The museum is named after Alfred Herbert, ...
, Coventry. In 2001 Bevan relocated to
Uzès Uzès (; ) is a commune in the Gard department in the Occitanie region of Southern France. Uzès lies about north-northeast of Nîmes, west of Avignon, and southeast of Alès. History Originally ''Ucetia'' or ''Eutica'' in Latin, Uzès wa ...
, where the scope of his painting broadened again to include landscapes and, more recently, the effect of light on water. Exhibitions at galleries in Paris,
Brussels Brussels, officially the Brussels-Capital Region, (All text and all but one graphic show the English name as Brussels-Capital Region.) is a Communities, regions and language areas of Belgium#Regions, region of Belgium comprising #Municipalit ...
,
Montpellier Montpellier (; ) is a city in southern France near the Mediterranean Sea. One of the largest urban centres in the region of Occitania (administrative region), Occitania, Montpellier is the prefecture of the Departments of France, department of ...
and
Avignon Avignon (, , ; or , ; ) is the Prefectures in France, prefecture of the Vaucluse department in the Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur region of southeastern France. Located on the left bank of the river Rhône, the Communes of France, commune had a ...
in 2004–2011Oliver Bevan at Galerie de l'Ancien Courrier, Montpellier.
/ref> were followed by a retrospective exhibition in Uzès in 2012.


References


External links


Oliver Bevan's websiteA selection of Bevan's Op Art paintings, 1964–72, on Flickr
{{DEFAULTSORT:Bevan, Oliver 1941 births Academic staff of the University of Saskatchewan Alumni of the Royal College of Art British abstract artists 20th-century English painters English male painters 21st-century English painters 21st-century English male artists English contemporary artists Living people People educated at Eton College People from Peterborough 20th-century English male artists