John Minton (1917 - 1957)

 

English painter and illustrator with family connection to Minton ceramics; studied at St John's Wood School of Art, 1935-1938, and in Paris, where he and Michael Ayrton shared a studio, 1938- 1939; served in the British Army, 1941-1943; then became a prominent painter, designing the sets and costumes for Sir John Gielgud's Macbeth; shared a studio with the two Roberts - Colquhoun and MacBryde, while living in the same building as Jankel Adler, Ronald Searle and John Wyndham; produced works for seven one-man shows between 1945 and 1956; his eclectic style combined elements of French and English Neo-Romanticism; his main theme was the young male figure in emotionally charged settings; the five phases of his work ranged from landscapes reminiscent of Samuel Palmer to scenes of urban devastation and decay; he taught at the Camberwell School of Art, 1943-1946, the Central School of Arts and Crafts, 1946-1948, and at the Royal College of Art, till 1957; he was charismatic, charming, and generous but also at times melancholic and self-destructive; he was an outstanding draughtsman and produced a prodigious number of paintings, illustrations and drawings; his reputation suffered, however, as the English Neo-Romantic movement declined.

 

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