Euan Uglow

Euan Uglow (1932 - 2000)

Euan Uglow was born in South West London in 1932. Briefly evacuated during the war, Uglow enrolled at Camberwell School of Art in 1947, leaving to join the Slade School of Fine Art in 1950, where William Coldstream had been made Professor the year before. Even amongst a young group of exceptional painters including Craigie Aitchison, Michael Andrews and Howard Hodgkin, Uglow was immediately recognised as a precocious talent, winning the Slade’s first prize in figure painting and a scholarship to travel to Spain. Whilst a student, he was influenced both by his teachers, including the Euston Road School founders, Coldstream, Victor Pasmore, and Claude Rogers, and external infl uences such as quattrocento Italian painting and Giacometti. Upon leaving the Slade, Uglow taught part-time at Camberwell, St Albans School of Art, and the Slade itself. In 1959, he moved to his studio in Turnchapel Mews in Battersea, where he lived and painted for his entire life. In 1972, Uglow won first prize in the John Moores Liverpool Exhibition 8, Walker Art Gallery for Nude from Twelve Regular Vertical Positions from the Eye, 1964. He served as an Artist Trustee at the National Gallery, London, was a Fellow of University College, London, and an Honorary Member of the London Institute. Uglow travelled widely to paint and teach: to Morocco, Turkey, India, China, Cyprus, and Italy. He died in London in 2000. A pre-eminent post-war British artist, Uglow transformed figurative painting, subjecting perception to an unprecedented rigorous and meticulous scrutiny.

During his lifetime, Uglow had numerous exhibitions at Browse & Darby in London and Salander O’Reilly in New York, retrospectives at the Whitechapel in 1974, and 1989, and a posthumous exhibition at Abbot Hall Art Gallery, Kendal in 2003. His work was featured, often alongside William Coldstream, in seminal group exhibitions including Eight Figurative Painters; 1981-2; Yale Center for British Art and The School of London and their Friends: The Collection of Elaine and Melvin Merians, 1999-2000; Yale Center for British Art. His work is held in major international private and public collections including the Tate, the Arts Council and the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York.