Barry Burman (1943–2001) was an English figurative artist known for his dark and often disturbing subject matter. He was a successful as an artist and teacher. He took an overdose and died aged 57.

Early life

Burman was born in

Bedford Bedford is a market town in Bedfordshire, England. At the 2011 Census, the population of the Bedford built-up area (including Biddenham and Kempston) was 106,940, making it the second-largest settlement in Bedfordshire, behind Luton, whilst ...

in June 1943. He gained a 2/1 in

fine art In European academic traditions, fine art is developed primarily for aesthetics or creative expression, distinguishing it from decorative art or applied art, which also has to serve some practical function, such as pottery or most metalwork ...

Coventry Coventry ( or ) is a City status in the United Kingdom, city in the West Midlands (county), West Midlands, England. It is on the River Sherbourne. Coventry has been a large settlement for centuries, although it was not founded and given its ...

College of Art and continued his studies for a while at the

Royal College of Art The Royal College of Art (RCA) is a public research university in London, United Kingdom, with campuses in South Kensington, Battersea and White City. It is the only entirely postgraduate art and design university in the United Kingdom. It offe ...

. Tutors at Coventry included Michael Sandle and Ivor Abrahams both Royal Academicians. Fellow students on his course were Mike Baldwin the conceptualist artist, Fred Orton the Art Historian, Sue Gollifer the print miniaturist and digital artist, Phillip Wetton who went on to teach at Browns University in the United States.

Employment

Despite his success as an artist, he continued to teach

part-time Part-time can refer to: * Part-time job, a job that has fewer hours a week than a full-time job * Part-time student, a student, usually in higher education, who takes fewer course credits than a full-time student * Part Time Part Time (styliz ...

at Mid-Warwickshire College in Leamington between 1974 and 1994.

Artistic method

Burman painted with oil, acrylic, ink and wax

crayon A crayon (or wax pastel) is a stick of pigmented wax used for writing or drawing. Wax crayons differ from pastels, in which the pigment is mixed with a dry binder such as gum arabic, and from oil pastels, where the binder is a mixture of wax an ...

mixed with

egg yolk Among animals which produce eggs, the yolk (; also known as the vitellus) is the nutrient-bearing portion of the egg whose primary function is to supply food for the development of the embryo. Some types of egg contain no yolk, for example bec ...

and

vinegar Vinegar is an aqueous solution of acetic acid and trace compounds that may include flavorings. Vinegar typically contains 5–8% acetic acid by volume. Usually, the acetic acid is produced by a double fermentation, converting simple sugars to et ...

on thick paper to produce an extraordinary leathery surface. Shortly before his death, Burman began to work in a new medium, creating a series of Papier-mâché figures / puppets - a return in three dimensions to earlier themes ('Leather Face', 'Uncle Tic Tac' and 'Tommy Rawhead').

Artistic themes

"If one had erroneously formed an impression of sadism or brutality, an encounter with the artist changed one's mind. His nature was as far as one could get from that of the monsters he portrayed. He was the most gentle, the most non-judgemental, the most modest man, affectionate to his friends, caring of them, supportive, and he was also among the most committed of artists." Reprinted as an essay in catalogue for retrospective exhibition at The Royal Pump Rooms, Leamington Spa, 2004

Sexuality and feminism

His early paintings are described by the critic Peter Webb as: "meticulous and controversial images which addressed his ideas on women's sexuality; provocative schoolgirls on black leather sofas; malevolent nudes clutching Victorian dolls; and threatening femme fatales grasping severed male heads". According to Webb, this led on one occasion to a physical attack from

feminist Feminism is a range of socio-political movements and ideologies that aim to define and establish the political, economic, personal, and social equality of the sexes. Feminism incorporates the position that society prioritizes the male po ...

critics on a

BBC2 BBC Two is a British free-to-air public broadcast television network owned and operated by the BBC. It covers a wide range of subject matter, with a remit "to broadcast programmes of depth and substance" in contrast to the more mainstream an ...

television program Television, sometimes shortened to TV, is a telecommunication medium for transmitting moving images and sound. The term can refer to a television set, or the medium of television transmission. Television is a mass medium for advertising, e ...

. Reprinted as an essay in catalogue for retrospective exhibition at The Royal Pump Rooms, Leamington Spa, 2004

Murder

In the 1980s, he created a number of images inspired by both real-life and fictional serial-killers, including

Jack the Ripper Jack the Ripper was an unidentified serial killer active in and around the impoverished Whitechapel district of London, England, in the autumn of 1888. In both criminal case files and the contemporaneous journalistic accounts, the killer wa ...

Ed Gein Edward Theodore Gein (; August 27, 1906 – July 26, 1984), also known as the Butcher of Plainfield or the Plainfield Ghoul, was an American murderer and body snatcher. Gein's crimes, committed around his hometown of Plainfield, Wisconsin, ga ...

and

Hannibal Lecter Dr. Hannibal Lecter is a Character (arts), fictional character created by the novelist Thomas Harris. Lecter is a serial killer who Human cannibalism, eats his victims. Before his capture, he was a respected Forensic psychiatry, forensic psychi ...

. According to Malcolm Yorke, he visited the scenes of the

Whitechapel Whitechapel is a district in East London and the future administrative centre of the London Borough of Tower Hamlets. It is a part of the East End of London, east of Charing Cross. Part of the historic county of Middlesex, the area formed ...

murders which "still exuded a scent of evil, or 'agony traces' as he called them".Malcolm Yorke, ''The Times'' (London), 24 May 2001 (obituary). Reprinted as an essay in catalogue for retrospective exhibition at The Royal Pump Rooms, Leamington Spa, 2004 In 1991, Burman won the Hunting Group / ''The Observer'' award with his painting 'Manac Es', inspired by the Whitechapel murders as fictionalised in

Iain Sinclair Iain Sinclair FRSL (born 11 June 1943) is a writer and filmmaker. Much of his work is rooted in London, recently within the influences of psychogeography. Biography Education Sinclair was born in Cardiff in 1943. From 1956 to 1961, he was educate ...

's first novel 'White Chappell, Scarlet Tracings'.

Street scenes

Also in the 1980s, Burman painted a number of fine streetscenes (including 'Angel Alley') and doorways in Whitechapel: "The area's blistered paint and cancerous brickwork ... offered him visual stimuli - and nobody could suggest more menace in a wall or cracked window than Burman".

Politics

In the 1980s, he tackled political themes, most notably the "chauvinism and bloody mindedness" of

Margaret Thatcher Margaret Hilda Thatcher, Baroness Thatcher (; 13 October 19258 April 2013) was Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1979 to 1990 and Leader of the Conservative Party (UK), Leader of the Conservative Party from 1975 to 1990. S ...

's premiership and the

Falklands War The Falklands War ( es, link=no, Guerra de las Malvinas) was a ten-week undeclared war between Argentina and the United Kingdom in 1982 over two British dependent territories in the South Atlantic: the Falkland Islands and its territorial de ...

('Patriots').

Solo exhibitions

During his lifetime, Burman had nine solo exhibitions. *1969: Coventry College of Art *1969:

Leamington Spa Royal Leamington Spa, commonly known as Leamington Spa or simply Leamington (), is a spa town and civil parish in Warwickshire, England. Originally a small village called Leamington Priors, it grew into a spa town in the 18th century following ...

Art Gallery *1971: University of Warwick *1974:

Ikon Gallery The Ikon Gallery () is an English gallery of contemporary art, located in Brindleyplace, Birmingham. It is housed in the Grade II listed, neo-gothic former Oozells Street Board School, designed by John Henry Chamberlain in 1877. Ikon was set u ...

, Birmingham *1977: Warwick Gallery *1982: Herbert Art Gallery, Coventry *1992: Nicholas Treadwell Gallery, London *1997: Loyal to the Nightmare, Goldmark Gallery, Uppingham *1999: The Pilgrim's Progress: Goldmark Gallery, Uppingham John Bunyan's ''

The Pilgrim's Progress ''The Pilgrim's Progress from This World, to That Which Is to Come'' is a 1678 Christian allegory written by John Bunyan. It is regarded as one of the most significant works of theological fiction in English literature and a progenitor of ...

'' was based upon a work that is said to be placed in American hotel bedrooms because it is too dull for anyone to steal it.Glyn Hughes: Barry Burman - The Pilgrim's Progress, Goldmark, 1999 Glyn Hughes has linked the idea to Burman's own childhood (he was baptised in the same font as Bunyan and regularly visited the church), his belief in

Republicanism Republicanism is a political ideology centered on citizenship in a state organized as a republic. Historically, it emphasises the idea of self-rule and ranges from the rule of a representative minority or oligarchy to popular sovereignty. It ...

shared with Bunyan, and a healing process for Burman himself. Following his death, there have been three retrospectives: *2004: Barry Burman retrospective, The Royal Pump Rooms, Leamington Spa *2007: The Unseen Burman, Gallery 12, London *2008: Burman - Barry Burman 1943 - 2001, Knifesmith Gallery, Bristol

Other exhibitions

Burman has also exhibited at many group shows in the UK and abroad.

Dedication

Nicholas Royle Nicholas Royle (born 20 March 1963 in Manchester) is an English novelist, editor, publisher, literary reviewer and creative writing lecturer. Literary career Author Royle has written seven novels: ''Counterparts'', ''Saxophone Dreams'', ''The Mat ...

's novel ''Antwerp'' (

Serpent's Tail Serpent's Tail is London-based independent publishing firm founded in 1986 by Pete Ayrton. It specialises in publishing work in translation, particularly European crime fiction. In January 2007, it was bought by a British publisher Profile Books ...

, 2004) is dedicated to Barry Burman.

Death

Burman took an overdose and died in 2001, aged 57.

References

External links

Barry Burman Exhibition at Knifesmith Gallery, Bristol
{{DEFAULTSORT:Burman, Barry Modern painters Academics of the Royal College of Art 1943 births 2001 deaths Drug-related suicides in England