Alfred Reginald Thomson (10 December 1894 – 27 October 1979) was an English artist and
Olympic Gold Medalist
This article lists the individuals who have won at least four gold medals at the Olympic Games or at least three gold medals in individual events.
List of most Olympic gold medals over career
This is a partial list of multiple Olympic gold medalis ...
, most notable for being an official
War Artist to the
Royal Air Force
The Royal Air Force (RAF) is the United Kingdom's air and space force. It was formed towards the end of the First World War on 1 April 1918, becoming the first independent air force in the world, by regrouping the Royal Flying Corps (RFC) and ...
during World War Two.
Biography
Thomson was born in Bangalore in India where his father George was a British civil servant who had married an Irish woman, Florence Green.
Thomson was deaf from birth and when the family returned to Britain from India he attended the Royal School for Deaf Children at
Margate
Margate is a seaside resort, seaside town on the north coast of Kent in south-east England. The town is estimated to be 1.5 miles long, north-east of Canterbury and includes Cliftonville, Garlinge, Palm Bay, UK, Palm Bay and Westbrook, Kent, ...
.
While at the school, he learnt sign language.
By the time he was 13, he was already six feet tall.
His father was unhappy that he had not learnt to speak terribly well, and transferred him to a small private oral school run by a Mr Barber at Brondesbury.
Later in life he was known, in the press, as the
"deaf and dumb" artist.
Although Thomson attended the London Art School in Kensington for a time, under C.M.Q. Orchardson, a son of
William Quiller Orchardson, and was tutored by
John Hassall, he failed to pass the exam for entry into the Royal Academy School, and his father sent him to work on a farm in Lenham, Kent, and forbade him from doing any art.
He left the farm, finding his first paid work designing posters at Vitagraph, in
Long Acre, for a whisky company.
He also created a series of posters for Daimler Cars.
At the end of the First World War Thomson established himself as a commercial artist and figure painter.
In the 1930s he created a series of murals for the Duncannon Hotel in London.
Thomson also had a talent as a caricaturist and he drew his fellow artists and friends.
Thomson completed a number of commissions for the
War Artists' Advisory Committee during World War Two and in September 1942 became a full-time salaried artist attached to the Air Ministry, taking over the post that
Eric Kennington had resigned from. Thomson painted several portraits of RAF air crews and also medical and civil defence subjects.
In 1945 Thomson was elected to the
Royal Academy
The Royal Academy of Arts (RA) is an art institution based in Burlington House on Piccadilly in London. Founded in 1768, it has a unique position as an independent, privately funded institution led by eminent artists and architects. Its pur ...
and soon became a highly respected society portrait painter.
He also continued to paint murals, most notably for the
Science Museum and the London Dental School.
In the
1948 Olympic Games in London, Thomson became the last person to win a
Gold Medal for painting as medals for art were abandoned in subsequent Olympic games.
References
External links
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Thomson, Alfred
1894 births
1979 deaths
20th-century English painters
English male painters
Artists from Bangalore
British war artists
Deaf artists
English deaf people
Olympic competitors in art competitions
English Olympic medallists
Olympic gold medalists in art competitions
Olympic gold medallists for Great Britain
Royal Academicians
World War II artists
Painters from Karnataka
20th-century English male artists
British artists with disabilities