David Prentice (4 July 1936 – 7 May 2014) was an English

artist An artist is a person engaged in an activity related to creating art, practicing the arts, or demonstrating an art. The common usage in both everyday speech and academic discourse refers to a practitioner in the visual arts only. However, th ...

and former art teacher. In 1964 he was one of the four founder members of Birmingham's Ikon Gallery. Prentice's work features in the collections of the Victoria and Albert Museum in London, Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery, the

Art Institute of Chicago The Art Institute of Chicago in Chicago's Grant Park, founded in 1879, is one of the oldest and largest art museums in the world. Recognized for its curatorial efforts and popularity among visitors, the museum hosts approximately 1.5 mill ...

, the Albright-Knox Art Gallery in Buffalo, New York and the Museum of Modern Art in New York City. Ashmolean Oxford, Bass Museum Miami, House of Commons Acquisition Committee Westminster, Betty Parsons New York, The Rank Organisation, Miami Dade Community College Miami, Arts Council of Great Britain and many private collections. He is four times winner of the Sunday Times Watercolour Competition - First Prize 1990, Second Prize 1999 and third prizes in 1996 and 2007. He was married to the quilt artist Dinah Prentice and since 1990 had lived and worked in Malvern, Worcestershire.

Biography

Prentice was born in Solihull and educated at

Moseley Road Secondary School of Art The Moseley School of Art () on Moseley Road, Balsall Heath, Birmingham, England was built as the first municipal branch School of Art in Birmingham. The Moseley School of Art was closed by the City of Birmingham Education Committee in 1976. The ...

, Birmingham between 1949 and 1952, and

Birmingham School of Art The Birmingham School of Art was a municipal art school based in the centre of Birmingham, England. Although the organisation was absorbed by Birmingham Polytechnic in 1971 and is now part of Birmingham City University's Faculty of Arts, Design a ...

between 1952 and 1957. In 1957 he did National Service in the Royal Artillery, returning to the Birmingham School of Art to teach from 1959. Prentice taught at the Faculty of

Birmingham Polytechnic , mottoeng = "Do what you are doing; attend to your business" , established = 1992—gained university status1971—City of Birmingham Polytechnic1843— Birmingham College of Art , type = Public , affiliation ...

between 1971 and 1986, initially in charge the experimental workshop, and has been a visiting artist at Trent Polytechnic, the University of Nottingham, the

Ruskin School The Ruskin School of Art, known as the Ruskin, is an art school at the University of Oxford, England. It is part of Oxford's Humanities Division. History The Ruskin grew out the Oxford School of Art, which was founded in 1865 and later beca ...

and the

Birmingham Institute of Art and Design , mottoeng = "Do what you are doing; attend to your business" , established = 1992—gained university status1971—City of Birmingham Polytechnic1843— Birmingham College of Art , type = Public , affiliation = ...

. - Prentice held solo exhibitions at the Royal Birmingham Society of Artists in 1961 and 1963, and in the same year as the second featured in the ''Four Letter Art'' exhibition organised by Trevor Denning. Prentice has since held over forty solo exhibitions. It was at Prentice's 1963 solo exhibition that his painting ''Kate and the Waterlilies'' was bought by

Angus Skene Angus Skene (died 2002) was a Scottish accountant, art collector and art gallery-owner, notable as the founder of the Ikon Gallery in Birmingham. Biography Skene developed an interest in contemporary art with his wife Midge while living near ...

for £25, with Prentice delivering the painting to Skene's house in Selly Oak strapped to the side of his Vespa scooter. Over the subsequent meal the two discussed the lack of support provided to local artists by Birmingham's existing galleries, and decided to start a new organisation to "invigorate the city with progressive ideas about art". Prentice recruited three fellow artists from the School of Art -

Jesse Bruton Jesse Bruton (born 1933) is a British artist, and a founder of the Ikon Gallery in Birmingham. He gave up painting in 1972, to become a picture conservator. Bruton was born in 1933 and was educated at Birmingham College of Art, where he later ...

, Robert Groves and

Sylvani Merilion Sylvani Merilion (née Smith) (4 October 1936 - 31 March 2019) was an English artist and former art teacher. In 1964 she was one of the four founder members of Birmingham's Ikon Gallery. Merilion's artworks in the 1960s featured images of astronau ...

- and in 1965 the four established the Ikon Gallery in a kiosk in Birmingham's Bull Ring. Prentice later said of Ikon's founders: David Prentice had shown his work at John Davies Fine Art, Moreton in Marsh Glos. England in eight solo exhibitions up until 2010 since 1996. He had held solo exhibitions of his work at Mark Barrow Fine Art (www.markbarrowfineart.co.uk), Art First London, Anna Mei Chadwick London, Medici Gallery London and Lemon Street Gallery, Truro, Cornwall in the years following 1994 and up to 2008. Exhibitions during July and August 2011 to celebrate his 75th birthday were at John Davies Gallery Moreton in Marsh, Number Nine the Gallery Birmingham and at Monnow Art Centre, Walterstone, Herefordshire.

Biography

References

Further reading