WILLIAM TOWNSEND

William Townsend was celebrated as painter and chronicler of his times. As Frances Spalding writes: "William Townsend occupies a very particular role within twentieth-century British art owing to his ability to try out, work through and assimilate what he needed from the fast-changing ideas and issues that animated painting before, during, and after the Second World War. He was observer, practitioner and commentator, a multiple role that gives him a special place in any record of that period."

William Townsend


1909        
Born 23 February in Wandsworth, London

1913        
Starts school

1919        
His frequently kept notes and sketches coalesce into a daily journal which, except during the war years, he continued until a few days before his death. These journals are now in the library of University College London.

1926        
Publication of Joan's Door, by Eleanor Farjeon (illustrated by Townsend).

Enters the Slade School of Fine Art, University College London, then headed by Professor Henry Tonks. Contemporaries and close friends include Elinor Bellingham Smith, Tommy Carr, William Coldstream, Anthony Devas, Edgar Hubert, Gabriel Lopez, Nicolette Macnamara, Rodrigo Moynihan, Claude Rogers, and Geoffrey Tibble.

1930        
Awarded the Orpen Bursary.

Completes studies at the Slade, and wins the newly-inaugurated Wilson Steer Landscape Prize for At Blashford (now in the collection of the Slade School).
        
1931-3        
Spends crucial nine months travelling, to Egypt, France, Italy and Tunisia. Makes paintings and drawings in Florence, Sienna, Rome, and various locations in Egypt and Tunisia.
        
1932        
First solo exhibition, Bloomsbury Gallery, London.
        
1933
Makes first paintings of Canterbury Cathedral.

Continues to live and work at his parents' home at Bridge, near Canterbury, whilst working as a book illustrator.

Becomes infatuated with the ballet and attends first performances of plays, the symphonic repertoire, openings and similar cultural events, usually in London.
        
1935        
Invited to contribute a work for an anti-fascist solidarity exhibition. Other artists include Duncan Grant, Paul Nash, Eric Gill, and Henry Moore.

1935-6        
Increasingly involved in anti-fascist politics, initially in support of the Basques and Republicans in Spain, then against the rise of Nazism, and the activities of the British Union of Fascists.
                
1938        
Invited to stand as Labour parliamentary candidate for Canterbury, but declines. Participates in anti-fascist rallies (including the Surrealist Demonstration in Trafalgar Square of 1 May 1938) until the outbreak of war.

1939        
Townsend makes comparatively few figurative paintings during his career but at this time he shows people at work, perhaps influenced by fellow A.I.A. members.

1939-40        
Completes sequence of A.R.P. (Air-Raid Precautions) drawings of Canterbury Cathedral, (now in the collection of the Friends of Canterbury Cathedral).
        
1940        
Makes prints for the A.I.A. "Everyman Prints" series, intended to make affordable art for the public.
        
1941-6        
War service as battery officer in Royal Artillery, later transferring to Army Education Corps, where he works with the musician Eric Fenby (formerly amanuensis to Frederick Delius), and paints his portrait.
        
1942        
Marries Mary Baxter
        
1945
Daughter Charlotte born on July 5
        
1946-9
Teaches at the Camberwell School of Arts and Crafts on a part-time basis.

Makes paintings of post-war London. In a letter to The Times (June, 1947), he and Coldstream call for the preservation of a number of Wren churches burnt out during the Blitz, including St Mary Aldermanbury and St Alban, Wood Street, which are the subjects of paintings by both.

Occasional broadcasting and journalism on architecture and contemporary art.
        
1949        
Family moves to Rolvenden, Kent and retains a small flat in London near the Slade. The landscape of the Weald of Kent will dominate his English painting for the rest of his life.

Joins teaching staff at the Slade School of Fine Art upon William Coldstream's appointment as Slade Professor. Colleagues will include Stuart Brisley, Reg Butler, Bernard Cohen, Andrew Forge, Patrick George, Nikos Georgiadis, Robert Medley, Thomas Monnington, Claude Rogers, Ian Tregarthen Jenkin and Euan Uglow.         
        
1951        
Elected to the London Group.

First visit to Canada at the invitation of the Banff School of Fine Arts in Alberta (now the Banff Centre), in the Canadian Rockies, to teach the summer session. Returned to the school for eleven sessions until his death there in 1973. First paintings of Canadian landscapes and studies of mountains derived
from sketches en plein air are made over the next two years in his studio in Kent.

Son Nicholas born on 29 December.        
        
1957
Appointed Senior Lecturer in Fine Arts, University College London.
                
1962-3        
Visiting professor in the Department of Fine Arts, University of Alberta, Edmonton.
        
1963        
Invited to serve as co-selector of works for the first comprehensive exhibition of the works of William Coldstream, organised by the British Council.
        
1964-5        
Tours Canada as sole juror to select the Sixth Biennial Exhibition of Canadian Painting for the National Gallery of Canada, for which he writes the catalogue essay and notes.
        
1966        
Appointed Head of Painting Division, Banff School of Fine Arts.
        
1967        
Resigned from the London Group.
        
1968        
Elected Fellow of University College London, and appointed Professor of Fine Art (personal chair), with responsibility for establishing and coordinating the post-graduate programme at the Slade School.
        
1970        
Editor and co-author, 'Canadian Art Today' (Studio International, London and New York); first published a special issue of Studio International, then as stand-alone publication in hard-back.
                
1973        
Dies on 4 July, in Banff, Alberta.

Establishment of annual William Townsend Memorial Lecture at University College London (lecturers will include Norman
Bryson, Reg Butler, Anthony Caro, Andrew Causey, Bernard Cohen, Richard Cork, Michael Craig-Martin, Thomas Crow,
Richard Deacon, Robyn Denny, Andrew Forge, Anthony Grmley, Peter Greenaway, Richard Hamilton, Anthony Hill, Susan
Hillier, Ivon Hitchens, Howard Hodgkin, Norbert Lynton, Kenneth Martin, Leslie Martin, Bruce McLean, Declan
McGonagle, Cornelia Parker, Bridget Riley, Richard Rogers, Lawrence Weiner, Rachel Whiteread, and Richard
Wollheim).

Townsend Memorial Scholarship established at the Banff Centre.
        
1976        
Extracts from the Journals published as The Townsend Journals - An Artist's Record of his Times 1928-51, edited by Andrew
Forge, (Tate Gallery, London, 1976).

Retrospective exhibition at Tate Gallery, London.
                
2005        
William Townsend Symposium, Clare Hall, Cambridge (chaired by Professor Dame Gillian Beer, participants include
Professor David Cast, Professor Emeritus Bernard Cohen, Dr. James Hyman, and Dr. Frances Spalding).


Selected Exhibitions


2006
Home and Away, James Hyman Gallery, London

William Townsend; Landscape Paintings 1930-1950, James Hyman Gallery, London

1976
William Townsend, Tate Gallery, London