| Adrian Morris 30 May 1963: All that I have done with what I consider to have any measure of success in my painting is related to the earth. Growing from it; living close to it; and ultimately returning to it. Man-made forms interest me only as a residuum of man, returning ultimately to the universal compost.
June 1963: My aim is to compact and to concentrate, to solidify and make concrete, to gather energies inward rather than release them outward. To make my pictures firm and clear rather than confused and diffuse, to gather - as it were - threads of confused and directionless energy and bind them back into a living organism.
March 1978: We necessarily experience the world through our bodies, we have as it were a view from a house of blood, either in darkness or filled with light, looking out on terrains both hostile and seductive. I believe some of my paintings perhaps reflect something of the continually changing relationship between that which lies within, and without.
April 1978: For me painting has been an attempt to create an environment in which life could exist. The mass of the land suggesting space, and space-evoking air. To do this with sufficient conviction that you can imagine dust could settle; in fact almost appearing to do so. And beyond that, searching as it were in the dust for new life, or rather for the understanding from which it may be created.
Adrian Morris in his Clapham studio,1978
Please scroll down for more photographs and biography
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Adrian with Globe, 1930
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with pet Dachshund, The Rectory, East Quantoxhead, 1932
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on the beach, Somerset (centre), 1935
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in the Rectory garden, East Quantoxhead, 1937
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at Putney School, Vermont, 1942
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Michael and Adrian Morris
with Professor John L Sweeney, Head of Poetry
at Harvard University, 1942
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Adrian aged 14, in the USA, 1943
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The Life Room at the Royal Academy Schools
(front row, second from the left), 1952
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in his Chelsea studio, 1964
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Adrian with his wife Audrey, 1968
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at the Hayward Gallery, London,
during the Hayward Annual '78, 1978
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| Biography | | 1929 | Born 18th May in Westminster, London, the youngest of three brothers. His father, the Rev. Arthur Grant Morris - an accomplished violinist and writer - is curate at the church of St John's, Smith Square | | 1931 | Family moved to Somerset when his father became Rector of the parish church of East Quantoxhead. The poet Cecil Day Lewis, himself the son of a clergyman, and his first wife are frequent visitors. Adrian has fondly remembered childhood at the rectory, close to the beach and Quantox hills, with dogs and woolly monkeys as pets. His mother is sensitive to creative pursuits which she encourages in her sons | | 1940 | After the outbreak of war, his father joins the army as Chaplain of the Forces | | 1941 | His mother takes Adrian and his brothers to stay with relatives in the USA, for safety | | 1942 | Attends the Putney School, Vermont, USA, a mixed progressive school dedicated to 'the cultivation of the imagination and creativity through the arts' where his talents are encouraged. From the age of fourteen he determines to be a painter. Greatly influenced by the surrealist movement active in New York at this time, and through family friend John L Sweeney, Head of Poetry at Harvard, visits the studios of artists Yves Tanguy, Jean Helion and Andre Masson. While recovering from a serious mastoid infection he is provided by Sweeney with books on art and poetry, which have a profound and lasting influence. Leaves Putney School in 1946 | | 1947 | Returns to London, the family accompanied by the poet T S Eliot on the return voyage. Studies for a year at the Anglo French Art Centre in London, an experimental school where artists from the Ecole de Paris including Andre Lhote and Oscar Dominguez come to teach. Fellow students Michael Wishart and Sri Lankan painter Ivan Peries become lifelong friends | | 1948 | Called up for (non-commissioned) military service in the Royal Horseguards, and posted to Germany. Frustrated at not being able to paint but reads widely | | 1950 | Studies for a year at the Academie de la Grande Chaumiere, Paris, concentrating on drawing | | 1951 | Studies at the Royal Academy Schools. William Rushbury, Keeper, comments on his individual outlook, intense concentration and very original works. Awarded RA Schools Certificate in 1954 | | 1955 | Given a one-man show of paintings and drawings at the St George's Gallery, London, which includes a number of drawings and large tempera paintings of the crucifixion produced while at the RA Schools | | Works included in Artists of Fame and Promise at the Leicester Galleries | | 1956 | Paintings included in Leicester Galleries Winter exhibition. Marries Penelope Dendy and moves to Brighton, returning after a year to live in Chelsea where son Alexander is born in 1958. (Marriage ends 1961). Takes up part-time art teaching post at school in Surrey. Painting landscapes | | 1963 | Marries Audrey Baker and they have two children, Zara (born 1968) and James (born 1969). Involved in the lively 60's art scene in Chelsea, with a wide circle of artist friends. Works intensely on barren, clay-like landscapes, in oil on gessoed panels | | 1967 | Tower blocks now begin to appear in paintings of otherwise barren land. Teaching pottery and art part-time at secondary schools | | 1969 | Encouraged by Erica Brausen, who includes paintings in Hanover Gallery show The Poetic Image. Inspired by moon landing to paint series of oil paintings and sketches of astronauts | | 1971 | Commences series of paintings with window-like openings onto desert wastes, introducing stronger colours - coral reds and dark blues | | 1973 | Moves house and studio from Chelsea to Clapham. Continues to teach. Paintings inspired by photographs of aerial views of harbours, airfields, oilfields and excavations, are again as if observed through a window or hatch | | 1975 | Continues, at every opportunity, to sketch ideas for paintings. Starts series of paintings of solitary refugees | | 1978 | Group of sixteen paintings included in Arts Council Hayward Annual '78 exhibition alongside Sandra Blow, Elisabeth Frink, Liliane Lijn, Stephen Cox and Michael Sandle | | 1981 | Figures, which feature strongly in preliminary drawings, are now eliminated from finished paintings | | 1989 | Retires from teaching and paints full time, images moving away from landscapes to focus on buildings, doorways, windows and interiors, the palette darkening | | 2000 | Becomes interested in having a solo exhibition and starts to show people his work with this in view. New paintings return to lunar landscape. Comments that he would like to be thought of as a painter of geology rather than of landscape | | 2004 | Produces a new painting inspired by photographs of Mars: Rocky Outcrop, the first in a planned series | | Diagnosed some years earlier with a serious heart condition which was thought to be under control. He dies suddenly and unexpectedly on 4th December |
| Solo Exhibitions | | 1955 | St. George's Gallery, London | | 2008 | Retrospective Exhibition, The Redfern Gallery |
| Group Exhibitions | | 1955 | Works included in Artists of Fame and Promise at the Leicester Galleries in London | | 1957 | Winter Exhibition, Leicester Gallery, London | | 1969 | The Poetic Image, Hanover Gallery, London | | 1978 | Hayward Annual '78, Hayward Gallery, London | | 1980 | Francis Kyle Gallery, London | | 1981 | Group show for the Bath Festival, Nevill Gallery, Bath | | 1985 | Nevill Gallery, Canterbury | | 1996 | Andre Lhote and Friends, Michael Parkin Gallery, London | | 2004 | 20th Century Perspectives, Burlington Fine Art, London |
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