Norman Toynton
   HOME

TheInfoList



OR:

Norman Toynton (born 25 January 1939, in London) is a British abstract painter who lived for many years in America, where his work was acclaimed for its 'grand visual and tactile splendour' and for 'marshal(ling) all the sensuous force of color and oil paint to induce us to look with truly questioning attention'. He was the Chair of Fine Arts at the
Massachusetts College of Art Massachusetts College of Art and Design, branded as MassArt, is a public college of visual and applied art in Boston, Massachusetts. Founded in 1873, it is one of the nation’s oldest art schools, the only publicly funded independent art school ...
and exhibited widely in New York and Boston. In 2006 he returned to England, where he lives and works on the North Norfolk coast and is currently in an exhibition at the
Yorkshire Sculpture Park The Yorkshire Sculpture Park (YSP) is an art gallery, with both open-air and indoor exhibition spaces, in West Bretton, Wakefield, in West Yorkshire, England. It shows work by British and international artists, including Henry Moore and Barbar ...
.


Early life and education

Born in London in 1939, Toynton's home was destroyed by bombing during the war and he spent his early childhood in a series of temporary accommodations. His father was a navigator's yeoman in the Royal Navy, where he served on the
Arctic convoys The Arctic convoys of World War II were oceangoing convoys which sailed from the United Kingdom, Iceland, and North America to northern ports in the Soviet Union – primarily Arkhangelsk (Archangel) and Murmansk in Russia. There were 78 convoys ...
. When he was 15, Toynton enrolled in the
Hornsey College of Art Hornsey College of Art (a.k.a. Hornsey School of Art) was a college in Crouch End in the London Borough of Haringey, England. The HCA was "an iconic British art institution, renowned for its experimental and progressive approach to art and design ...
; at 16, he had a painting accepted into the Royal Academy Summer Exhibition. He went on to study at the Royal College of Art, where he won the top painting prize in his first year. His classmates included
David Hockney David Hockney (born 9 July 1937) is an English painter, draftsman, printmaker, stage designer, and photographer. As an important contributor to the pop art movement of the 1960s, he is considered one of the most influential British artists o ...
,
R. B. Kitaj Ronald Brooks Kitaj (; October 29, 1932 – October 21, 2007) was an American artist who spent much of his life in England. Life He was born in Chagrin Falls, Ohio, United States. His Hungarian father, Sigmund Benway, left his mother, Jeanne ...
, and
Allen Jones Allen Jones may refer to: *Allen Jones (Continental Congress) (1739–1798), Continental Congress delegate *Allen Jones (artist) (born 1937), British pop artist *Allen Jones (record producer) (1940–1987), American record producer * A.J. Styles (A ...
. His first trip to the museums in Paris was with Allen Jones and
Ken Kiff __NOTOC__ Ken Kiff, (29 May 1935 – 15 February 2001) was an English figurative artist, was born in Dagenham and trained at Hornsey School of Art 1955-61. He came to prominence in the 1980s thanks to the championship of art critic Norbe ...
, his second with David Hockney.


Career in the UK

In the early 60s, Toynton was part of the first British Pop Art exhibition at the
Grabowski Gallery The Grabowski Gallery was an avant-garde art gallery opened in 1959 in London's Chelsea by Mateusz Grabowski, anticipating the Swinging Sixties. It hosted some of the earliest shows of the rising pop art movement and was the first venue in Lond ...
and participated in the first London happening with Carolee Schneemann at Dennison Hall. He was included in the John Moores Liverpool Exhibition, and created an installation piece for the Raume und Environmenten exhibition at the
Morsbroich Museum The Morsbroich Museum (german: Museum Morsbroich) or Morsbroich Castle Municipal Museum (''Städtisches Museum Schloss Morsbroich'') is a German museum of modern art situated in Leverkusen, 20 km north of Cologne. History A building referre ...
in Leverkusen with
Klaus Rinke Klaus Rinke (born 29 April 1939) is a German contemporary artist. Life and work Born in Wattenscheid, Rinke trained as a decorative artist and poster painter in Gelsenkirchen from 1954 to 1957. After studying painting from 1957 to 1960 at th ...
. He also showed at the Zwemmer Gallery (with John Walker), the RBA Galleries, and numerous other galleries throughout the UK. He began teaching under the radical art educator Tom Hudson at the
Leicester College of Art De Montfort University Leicester (DMU) is a public university in the city of Leicester, England. It was established in accordance with the Further and Higher Education Act in 1992 as a degree awarding body. The name De Montfort University was ta ...
in 1963 and then joined Hudson at the
Cardiff College of Art Cardiff School of Art & Design (CSAD) is one of the five schools that comprise Cardiff Metropolitan University. It originated as the Cardiff School of Art in 1865. History Cardiff School of Art & Design opened in 1865 as the Cardiff School of S ...
. Working with Hudson, along with Michael Sandle,
Terry Setch Terry Setch (born 1936) is a painter and Royal Academy, Royal Academy (RA) member who lives in Penarth, Wales. Education and career Setch attended Saturday classes at Sutton and Cheam School of Art, followed by a degree course at the Slade Sch ...
and Michael Tyzack, was a formative experience for him. Meanwhile, he'd become increasingly interested in the art coming out of America, particularly after the
Jackson Pollock Paul Jackson Pollock (; January 28, 1912August 11, 1956) was an American painter and a major figure in the abstract expressionist movement. He was widely noticed for his " drip technique" of pouring or splashing liquid household paint onto a hor ...
show at the
Whitechapel Gallery The Whitechapel Gallery is a public art gallery in Whitechapel on the north side of Whitechapel High Street, in the London Borough of Tower Hamlets. The original building, designed by Charles Harrison Townsend, opened in 1901 as one of the fir ...
in 1958, and his work was tending more towards abstraction. Toynton was a member of 56 Group Wales from 1967 to 1971.


Career in the US

In 1969, Toynton became the visiting artist at
Ohio State University The Ohio State University, commonly called Ohio State or OSU, is a public land-grant research university in Columbus, Ohio. A member of the University System of Ohio, it has been ranked by major institutional rankings among the best publ ...
in America; he was then Chairman of the Art Department at the
University of Victoria The University of Victoria (UVic or Victoria) is a public research university located in the municipalities of Oak Bay and Saanich, British Columbia, Canada. The university traces its roots to Victoria College, the first post-secondary insti ...
. Later he moved to Boston and became Chair of Fine Art at the
Massachusetts College of Art Massachusetts College of Art and Design, branded as MassArt, is a public college of visual and applied art in Boston, Massachusetts. Founded in 1873, it is one of the nation’s oldest art schools, the only publicly funded independent art school ...
. During the 70s, he created a number of large installation pieces for solo exhibitions at the
Whitechapel Gallery The Whitechapel Gallery is a public art gallery in Whitechapel on the north side of Whitechapel High Street, in the London Borough of Tower Hamlets. The original building, designed by Charles Harrison Townsend, opened in 1901 as one of the fir ...
in London, the Institute of Contemporary Art in Boston and the Williams College Museum of Art. At the end of this decade he returned to creating smaller paintings, working with the same material he had begun using in his installations: Masonite pegboard, which he described as "moribund, Orwellian…standing for everything that 'threatens to destroy painting, the most individualistic, human activity I know of". Pegboard, on which he variously painted directly or hung lushly textured and patterned wooden elements, became his trademark. Many of his paintings consisted of series of painted Masonite panels, with subtle variations from one to the next, in order to slow the viewer down and compel close scrutiny. In a review of one of his solo exhibitions in Artnews,
David Bonetti David Bonetti (c. 1947 – April 4, 2018) was an American art critic. Early life David Bonetti was born circa 1947 and grew up in Boston, Massachusetts. His father was Italian and his mother Irish. He graduated from Brandeis University in 1969. ...
called his paintings 'works of such authenticity that they are shocking…Toynton dares to salvage beauty from the banal', while Kenneth Baker, in a feature article on him in ArtForum, declared, 'I know of few abstract painters who have the patience and intelligence to practice their art deliberately enough to let us see painting for the thinking process it is. One of the most accomplished of these is Norman Toynton.' In the 80s, Toynton quit his teaching job and moved to New York City, where he showed his work in a wide variety of venues, including the Brooklyn Museum, the Hunter College Gallery, the Ruth Siegel Gallery, the John Good Gallery, the Stux Gallery and the Daniel Newburg Gallery. Arthur C. Danto cited one of his solo exhibitions as among the three outstanding shows of the year in The Nation.Arthur C Danto, Critics’ Year-End Choices, The Nation, December 27, 1986 Toynton then retreated to rural Vermont, before making several extended trips to India. In 2006, he returned to England for good, building himself a studio at his home on the North Norfolk coast. His work has since been shown at ArtSpace and several other London venues, as well as at the
Yorkshire Sculpture Park The Yorkshire Sculpture Park (YSP) is an art gallery, with both open-air and indoor exhibition spaces, in West Bretton, Wakefield, in West Yorkshire, England. It shows work by British and international artists, including Henry Moore and Barbar ...
.


Selected collections

* Alfonso Ossorio Foundation *
Rose Art Museum The Rose Art Museum, founded in 1961, is a part of Brandeis University in Waltham, Massachusetts, US. Named after benefactors Edward and Bertha Rose, it offers temporary exhibitions, and it displays and houses works of art from the permanent col ...
* JP Morgan Chase * Time Warner * Other Press *
Williams College Museum of Art The Williams College Museum of Art (WCMA) is a college-affiliated art museum in Williamstown, Massachusetts. It is located on the campus of Williams College, and is close to the Massachusetts Museum of Contemporary Art (MASS MoCA) and the Clark Ar ...
* Museum Narodowe, Warsaw, Poland * Nottingham City Museum * National Library of Wales * Bradford Museum


Prizes

* Lignano Biennale Prize, Italy * Prix Chateau de la Sarraz, Switzerland *
Pollock-Krasner Foundation The Pollock-Krasner Foundation was established in 1985 for the purpose of providing financial assistance to individual working artists of established ability. It was established at the bequest of Lee Krasner, who was an American abstract expressio ...
Grant *
Adolph and Esther Gottlieb Foundation The Adolph and Esther Gottlieb Foundation was established in 1976. It is an American nonprofit organization that provides funding for the arts. History The Gottlieb Foundation was established after Adolph Gottlieb’s death in 1974. Esther Gottlieb ...
Grant


References


External links

*
Personal profile
{{DEFAULTSORT:Toynton, Norman 1939 births 20th-century British painters British male painters 21st-century British painters Living people Members of the 56 Group Wales Painters from London 20th-century British male artists 21st-century British male artists