John Keith Vaughan (23 August 1912 – 4 November 1977), was a British painter.

Biography

Born at

Selsey Selsey is a seaside town and civil parish, about eight miles (12 km) south of Chichester in West Sussex, England. Selsey lies at the southernmost point of the Manhood Peninsula, almost cut off from mainland Sussex by the sea. It is bounde ...

West Sussex West Sussex is a county in South East England on the English Channel coast. The ceremonial county comprises the shire districts of Adur, Arun, Chichester, Horsham, and Mid Sussex, and the boroughs of Crawley and Worthing. Covering an ar ...

, Vaughan attended

Christ's Hospital Christ's Hospital is a public school (English independent boarding school for pupils aged 11–18) with a royal charter located to the south of Horsham in West Sussex. The school was founded in 1552 and received its first royal charter in 1553 ...

school. He worked in an advertising agency until the

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

, when as an intending

conscientious objector A conscientious objector (often shortened to conchie) is an "individual who has claimed the right to refuse to perform military service" on the grounds of freedom of thought, conscience, or religion. The term has also been extended to object ...

he joined the

St John Ambulance St John Ambulance is the name of a number of affiliated organisations in different countries which teach and provide first aid and emergency medical services, and are primarily staffed by volunteers. The associations are overseen by the internat ...

; in 1941 he was conscripted into the

Non-Combatant Corps The Non-Combatant Corps (NCC) was a corps of the British Army composed of conscientious objectors as privates, with NCOs and officers seconded from other corps or regiments. Its members fulfilled various non-combatant roles in the army during the ...

. Vaughan was self-taught as an artist. His first exhibitions took place during the war. In 1942 he was stationed at Ashton Gifford near

Codford Codford is a civil parish south of Salisbury Plain in the Wylye Valley in Wiltshire, England. Its settlements are the adjacent villages of Codford St Peter and Codford St Mary, which lie some southeast of Warminster. The two villages are on th ...

in Wiltshire, and paintings from this time include ''The Wall at Ashton Gifford'' (

Manchester Art Gallery Manchester Art Gallery, formerly Manchester City Art Gallery, is a publicly owned art museum on Mosley Street in Manchester city centre. The main gallery premises were built for a learned society in 1823 and today its collection occupies three c ...

). During the war Vaughan formed friendships with the painters

Graham Sutherland Graham Vivian Sutherland (24 August 1903 – 17 February 1980) was a prolific English artist. Notable for his paintings of abstract landscapes and for his portraits of public figures, Sutherland also worked in other media, including printmaking ...

and John Minton, with whom after

demobilisation Demobilization or demobilisation (see spelling differences) is the process of standing down a nation's armed forces from combat-ready status. This may be as a result of victory in war, or because a crisis has been peacefully resolved and militar ...

in 1946 he shared premises. Through these contacts he formed part of the neo-romantic circle of the immediate post-war period. However, Vaughan rapidly developed an idiosyncratic style which moved him away from the Neo-Romantics. Concentrating on studies of male figures, his works became increasingly abstract. Vaughan worked as an art teacher at the

Camberwell College of Arts Camberwell College of Arts is a public tertiary art school in Camberwell, in London, England. It is one of the six constituent colleges of the University of the Arts London. It offers further and higher education programmes, including postgrad ...

, the

Central School of Art The Central School of Art and Design was a public school of fine and applied arts in London, England. It offered foundation and degree level courses. It was established in 1896 by the London County Council as the Central School of Arts and Cr ...

and later at the

Slade School The UCL Slade School of Fine Art (informally The Slade) is the art school of University College London (UCL) and is based in London, England. It has been ranked as the UK's top art and design educational institution. The school is organised as ...

. Vaughan is also known for his journals, selections from which were published in 1966 and more extensively in 1989, after his death. A gay man troubled by his sexuality, he is known largely through those journals. He was diagnosed with cancer in 1975 and died by suicide in 1977 in London, recording his last moments in his diary as the drugs overdose took effect. The centenary of Keith Vaughan's birth was celebrated with an exhibition at Pallant House Gallery in Chichester, 'Keith Vaughan: Romanticism to Abstraction' (10 March to 10 June 2012). His auction record of £313,250 was set at Sotheby's, London, on 11 November 2009, for the oil on canvas ''Theseus and the Minotaur'', previously in the collection of

Richard Attenborough Richard Samuel Attenborough, Baron Attenborough, (; 29 August 192324 August 2014) was an English actor, filmmaker, and entrepreneur. He was the president of the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art (RADA) and the British Academy of Film and Televisio ...

(who bought it in 1967).

Exhibitions

;1944 : ''Keith Vaughan: Gouaches and Drawings'', Alex Reid and

Lefevre Gallery The Lefevre Gallery (or The Lefevre Galleries) was an art gallery in London, England, operated by Alex. Reid & Lefevre Ltd. The gallery was opened at 1a, King Street, St James's, in 1926, when rival art dealers Alexander Reid and Ernest Lefe ...

, London ;1946 : ''Keith Vaughan: Paintings and Gouaches'', Alex Reid and Lefevre Gallery, London ;1948 : ''Keith Vaughan: Paintings and Gouaches'', George Dix Gallery, New York : ''Keith Vaughan: Paintings, Gouaches and Monotypes'', Alex Reid and Lefevre Gallery, London ;1950 : ''Keith Vaughan: Paintings and Gouaches'', Instituto de Arte Moderno, Buenos Aires : ''Gouaches'', Redfern Gallery, London ;1951 : ''Keith Vaughan: Paintings and Gouaches'', Alex Reid and Lefevre Gallery, London ;1952 : ''Keith Vaughan: Retrospective Exhibition'', Redfern Gallery, London : ''Keith Vaughan – Drawings for Rimbaud: Une Saison en Enfer'', Hanover Gallery, London : ''Keith Vaughan: Paintings and Gouaches'', Durlacher Bros, New York ;1953 : ''Keith Vaughan: Paintings'', Leicester Galleries, London ;1955 : ''Keith Vaughan: Gouaches'', Leicester Galleries, London : ''Keith Vaughan: Paintings and Gouaches'', Durlacher Bros, New York ;1956 : ''Keith Vaughan: New Paintings'', Leicester Galleries, London : ''Keith Vaughan: Retrospective Show'', Hatton Gallery, Newcastle ;1957 : ''Keith Vaughan: Travelling Retrospective'', (based on Keith Vaughan: Retrospective Show, Hatton Gallery, Newcastle), Arts Council : ''Keith Vaughan: Paintings and Gouaches'', Durlacher Bros, New York ;1958 : ''Keith Vaughan: Paintings'', Leicester Galleries, London ;1959 : ''Keith Vaughan: Paintings and Gouaches'', Iowa State University, Ames, IA : ''Keith Vaughan, Leicester Galleries'', London ;1960 : ''Keith Vaughan: Paintings, Gouaches and Drawings'', Matthiesen Gallery, London ;1962 : ''Keith Vaughan: Retrospective Exhibition'', Whitechapel Gallery, London ;1963 : ''Keith Vaughan: Drawings,'' Bienal de Sao Paulo ;1964 : ''Keith Vaughan: Paintings, Gouaches and Charcoals'', Marlborough New London Gallery, London ;1965 : ''Keith Vaughan: Gouaches'', Bear Lane Gallery, Oxford : ''Keith Vaughan: Recent Gouaches'', Marlborough Fine Art, London ;1966 : ''Keith Vaughan: Paintings'', Durlacher Bros, New York ;1967 : ''Keith Vaughan: Retrospective Drawings'', Tib Lane Gallery, Manchester ;1968 : ''Keith Vaughan: Gouaches'', Rex Evans Gallery, Los Angeles, CA : ''Keith Vaughan: New Paintings'', Marlborough Fine Art, London : ''Keith Vaughan: Gouaches and Drawings 1942–46'', Hamet Gallery, London ;1969 : ''Keith Vaughan: Retrospective Exhibition'', Mappin Gallery, Sheffield : ''Keith Vaughan: Drawings'', Tib Lane Gallery, Manchester ;1970 : ''Keith Vaughan: Paintings, Gouaches and Drawings'', Bear Lane Gallery, Oxford : ''Keith Vaughan: Gouaches and Drawings'', Hamet Gallery, London : ''Keith Vaughan: Retrospective'', University of York, York ;1973 : ''Keith Vaughan: New Paintings'', Waddington Galleries, London : ''Keith Vaughan: Paintings in Gouaches'', Victor Waddington Gallery, London ;1976 : ''Keith Vaughan: New Paintings and Gouaches'', Waddington Galleries, London : ''Keith Vaughan: Paintings, Gouaches and Drawings'', Tib Lane Gallery, Manchester : ''Keith Vaughan: Paintings and Gouaches and Drawings'', Compass Gallery, Glasgow ;1977 : ''Keith Vaughan: Memorial Exhibition'', Mappin Art Gallery, Sheffield ;1981 : ''Keith Vaughan: Images of Man: Figurative Paintings: 1946–1960'', Geffrye Museum, London and Birmingham City Museum and Art Gallery ;1985 : ''Keith Vaughan: Drawings and Paintings'', New Grafton Gallery, London : ''Keith Vaughan: Early Drawings and Gouaches'', Thomas Agnew & Sons, London ;1987 : ''Keith Vaughan: Paintings and Drawings'', New Grafton Gallery, London : ''Keith Vaughan: Paintings, Gouaches, Watercolours and Drawings 1936–76'', Austin/Desmond Fine Art, Sunninghill : ''Keith Vaughan: Paintings, Watercolours and Drawings'', Mercury Gallery, Edinburgh : ''Keith Vaughan: Works on Paper'', Garry Anderson Gallery, Darlinghurst ;1989 : ''Keith Vaughan'', Austin/Desmond Fine Art, London : ''Keith Vaughan: Gouaches, Drawings, Notebook Sketches'', Redfern Gallery, London ;1990 : ''Keith Vaughan: Retrospective'', Thomas Agnew & Sons, London : ''Keith Vaughan: Paintings, Drawings, Gouaches'', Anthony Hepworth Fine Art, Bath ;1991 : ''Drawings of the Young Male'', St Jude's, London : ''Keith Vaughan: Drawings'', Anthony Hepworth Fine Art, Bath ;1994 : ''Keith Vaughan: Works on Paper'', Redfern Gallery, London ;1995 : ''Keith Vaughan: Les Illuminations de Rimbaud, an Exhibition of 42 Drawings'', Deka, London : ''Keith Vaughan: Paintings, Drawings and Gouaches'', Anthony Hepworth Fine Art, Bath ;1999 : ''Keith Vaughan: Gouaches and Drawings'', Anthony Hepworth Fine Art, Bath ;2000 : ''Keith Vaughan: Paintings, Gouaches, Drawings and Lithographs'', Julian Lax, London ;2002 : ''Keith Vaughan: Retrospective,'' Winter Fine Art and Antiques Fair, Olympia, London ;2004 : ''Keith Vaughan: Drawings'', Anthony Hepworth Fine Art, Bath ;2007 : ''Keith Vaughan: Figure and Landscape'', Victoria Art Gallery, Bath : ''Keith Vaughan: A Selection of Early Work from the Collection of Peter Adam'', Anthony Hepworth Fine Art, Bath : ''Keith Vaughan: Paintings and Drawings'', Osborne Samuel Gallery, London ;2009 : ''Keith Vaughan: Drawings,''

Abbott and Holder Abbott and Holder is an art gallery and dealership in London, England, that specialises in low-price, 19th- and 20th-century English paintings, watercolours, drawings and prints. The gallery has been located at 30 Museum Street, London WC1 s ...

, London ;2010 : ''Drawings and Sketches for Paintings 1945–1960'', Austin/Desmond Fine Art, London : ''Keith Vaughan: Four Decades of Drawing'', Gallery 27, London ;2011 : ''Keith Vaughan: Gouaches, Drawings and Prints'', Osborne Samuel Gallery, London : ''Keith Vaughan: Works on Paper'', Anthony Hepworth Fine Art, Bath ;2012 : ''Keith Vaughan'', Thomas Agnew & Sons, London : ''Keith Vaughan: Works on Paper from the Estate of Keith Vaughan'', Anthony Hepworth Fine Art, Bath : ''Keith Vaughan: Romanticism to Abstraction'', Pallant House Gallery, Chichester : ''Keith Vaughan'', Osborne Samuel Gallery, London

References

* ''Keith Vaughan. Journals & Drawings'', 1966, published in London by Alan Ross, 219 pages. * ''Keith Vaughan: Journals 1939–1977'', ed Alan Ross, 1989, published in London by John Murray, 217 pages, . * ''Keith Vaughan, His Life and Work'', Malcolm Yorke, 1990, published in London by Constable, 288 pages, (Hardback)

External links

*
Modern British Artists: Vaughan

{{DEFAULTSORT:Vaughan, Keith 1912 births 1977 deaths Military personnel from Sussex People educated at Christ's Hospital British conscientious objectors 20th-century English painters English male painters Gay artists English LGBT people Academics of the Central School of Art and Design Personnel of the Non-Combatant Corps People from Selsey British art teachers 1977 suicides 20th-century LGBT people 20th-century English male artists