11.08.07 – 02.09.07

Born in Epsom, on 13 December 1903, John Piper gave up law and studied art, first at Richmond School of Art and then, for only year and one term, at the Royal College of Art.

 From childhood and throughout the rest of his life Piper absorbed in words and pictures a broad swathe of this country’s Romantic heritage.  In his printmaking, as in his painting, he frequently took as his subject matter cottages and castles, abbeys and churches, mountains and menhirs, houses, coastlines, beaches, piers and harbours.  

 His painting, drawing, book illustration, photography and printmaking, his designs for stained glass and fabrics, his murals, stage sets and costume designs, and tapestries throughout his working life attracted comment and frequently considerable corrosive criticism.  His pictorial work at different times was attacked for being dramatic, decorative, topographical, illustrative, neo-Romantic, old fashioned, unrealistic, and too much concerned with rich colours and textures.

 The best topographical prints have that genius loci in time, rather than merely in the representation of the place, and much of Piper’s printmaking has this quality, in the same way as it is reflected in his painting, and which is clearly evident in this collection of his work.  John Piper died in 1992.