Roy Petley

Last updated

Roy Petley
Roy Petley.jpg
Born (1950-04-03) 3 April 1950 (age 72)
Grantham, Lincolnshire
NationalityBritish
Known forPainter
MovementImpressionism

Roy Petley (born 3 April 1950) is a British painter.

Contents

Petley paints en plein air to depict the wide expanse of English beaches and the gentle allure of Venetian landscapes. His works have been likened to those of John Constable, Edward Seago, and Campbell Mellon, British painters whose styles were influenced by the Barbizon school and Impressionism.

Beginning life in a children's home, he became one of the first artists to open an art gallery in Cork Street, a prestigious street lined with art galleries in London's Mayfair. His works are popularly collected by British royalty, including Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother.

Early life and background

The first-born son of a large family, Roy Petley was born on 3 April 1950 in Grantham, Lincolnshire. When he was five, Petley was abandoned to the Woodlands School near Uckfield, Sussex. The school also doubled as a home for abandoned children. He escaped his rough and often violent surroundings through art, teaching himself how to paint and draw.

At the age of sixteen, he received a scholarship to study art at Brighton University. But the pull of Italy and the country's old masters of art such as Leonardo da Vinci and Michelangelo proved too much. After a semester at Brighton University, he hitchhiked to Italy, settling in Florence where he eked out a living by drawing tourists who frequent the numerous cafes of the city, and studied the classics at the Uffizi Gallery and Palazzo Pitti. It was also in Florence that Petley had the chance to work with the collections of old master prints and drawings of the Gabinetto dei Disegni e Stampe of the Uffizi Gallery.

Career

Petley was only seventeen when he returned to England in 1968. At first, he headed for Belfast, Northern Ireland where the Bell Gallery provided support and encouragement for the young artist. But after some time in Ireland, Petley returned to London and succeeded in exhibiting his paintings in the galleries of the city's high-end shops, such as Liberty's and Heal's. To support his art, he worked in the art department of the Greenwich Theatre. [1]

By the age of 21, Petley left the theatre world altogether and began exhibiting his works on the railings of Green Park in London. In the 1970s, the perimeter of the park was home to mostly struggling local artists selling their works to the passing public. Exhibiting on Sundays, the Green Park railings were then respectably called "The Open Air Art Show". Though this tradition still continues, railings has since been occupied by individuals peddling tourist gifts and paintings made in China. He achieved minor success with American art dealers who took great interest in his work.

Following a chance encounter with the Duchess of Kent, a member of the late Queen Mother's household staff came to look at his works. Soon after William Tallon, the late Queen Mother's steward, returned to her with Petley's portrait study of Prince Charles, Petley was summoned to the Palace. Thus began the artist's long-standing friendship with the British Royals, which includes the Prince of Wales, the Duke of Edinburgh and the Duchess of Norfolk as his supporters. Exhibitions ensued in London and Dublin, and in places as far away as Dallas, Texas and the island of Barbados.

Art

In every work of art, Petley incorporates a play of light and shadows. As he moves from his natural medium of oil to watercolour or pastel to sanguine, there remains a certain youthful light emanates from his paintings. A plein air painter, his works reflect his surroundings - from the quiet beaches of Norfolk and the picturesque parks of Paris, to his subtle nudes draped with sheets and sunlight. He captures the romanticism of days gone by, with nary a modern automobile or electrical appliance blemishing his canvas.

Renowned British art critic, Brian Sewell, described Petley as "a painter who still paints, who brushes watercolour onto paper and oil paint onto canvas, a painter who even settles down to draw the nude from life - an absurdly old-fashioned discipline for an artist to pursue." [2]

Petleys

Petleys is a fine art gallery based in London. It was first known as Petley Fine Art. In October 2003, with his son Jason and a business partner, Petley established the London gallery with the intent of providing opportunities and promoting the work of other artists. The gallery is in Cork Street, home of numerous art galleries of great repute, the Royal Academy of Arts, and based in the affluent Mayfair district of London. In the spring of 2004, a second gallery was opened in Monte Carlo and the gallery often participated in the Monte Carlo Fine Art & Antiques Fair. The gallery's line-up of artists include established portrait painters Neil Forster, whose sitters have included the Prince of Wales and Martin Yeoman, who is a member of the Royal Society of Portrait Painters; as well as international artists such as Vincente Romero from Spain and Yuri Krotov from Russia. In June 2009, Petley Fine Art was reformed into Petleys.

List of exhibitions

Collections

See also

Related Research Articles

John Crome English painter

John Crome, once known as Old Crome to distinguish him from his artist son John Berney Crome, was an English landscape painter of the Romantic era, one of the principal artists and founding members of the Norwich School of painters. He lived in the English city of Norwich for all his life. Most of his works are of Norfolk landscapes.

John Sell Cotman English painter, illustrator and author

John Sell Cotman was an English marine and landscape painter, etcher, illustrator, author and a leading member of the Norwich School of painters.

The Norwich School of painters was the first provincial art movement established in Britain, active in the early 19th century. Artists of the school were inspired by the natural environment of the Norfolk landscape and owed some influence to the work of landscape painters of the Dutch Golden Age such as Hobbema and Ruisdael.

Joseph Stannard English artist

Joseph Stannard was an English marine, landscape and portrait painter. He was a talented and prominent member of the Norwich School of painters.

James Stark (painter) (1794 - 1859) British artist

James Stark was an English landscape painter. A leading member of the Norwich School of painters, he was elected vice-president of the Norwich Society of Artists in 1828 and became their president in 1829. He had wealthy patrons and was consistently praised by the Norfolk press for his successful London career.

George Vincent (painter) English painter

George Vincent was an English landscape painter who produced watercolours, etchings and oil paintings. He is considered by art historians to be one of the most talented of the Norwich School of painters, a group of artists connected by location and personal and professional relationships, who were mainly inspired by the Norfolk countryside. Vincent's work was founded on the Dutch school of landscape painting as well as the style of John Crome, also of the Norwich School. The school's reputation outside East Anglia in the 1820s was based largely upon the works of Vincent and his friend James Stark.

Luke Piper is an English landscape painter, especially in watercolours. The Guardian newspaper has described him as "arts establishment aristocracy".

Julian Trevelyan

Julian Otto Trevelyan was an English artist and poet.

Mildred Anne Butler was an Irish artist, who worked in watercolour and oil of landscape, genre and animal subjects. Butler was born and spent most of her life in Kilmurry, Thomastown, County Kilkenny and was associated with the Newlyn School of painters.

Henry Bright (painter) English painter

Henry Bright, was a distinguished English landscape painter associated with the Norwich School of painters.

Zsuzsi Roboz Hungarian artist (1929–2012)

Zsuzsi Roboz was a London-based Hungarian painter known for her portraiture paintings and paintings of the arts. Her work is in public galleries including the Tate Britain and The National Portrait Gallery.

Peter Kuhfeld English painter

Peter Kuhfeld is an English figurative painter. He was born in Cheltenham and is married to the English figurative painter Cathryn Kuhfeld, née Showan. They have two daughters who have often appeared in their paintings.

John Berney Crome English painter

John BerneyCrome was an English landscape and marine painter associated with the Norwich School of painters. He is sometimes known by the nickname 'Young Crome' to distinguish him from his father John, known as 'Old Crome'.

Piper family English artistic family of C20 & C21

The Piper family is an English artistic family of several generations.

Simon Carter (artist) Artist and curator

Simon Carter is an artist and curator who was born in Chelmsford, Essex in 1961.

John Thirtle English landscape painter (1777–1839)

John Thirtle was an English watercolour artist and frame-maker. Born in Norwich, where he lived for most of his life, he was a leading member of the Norwich School of painters.

Robert Dixon (1780–1815) was an English artist, known for his work in watercolour painting. He was a member of the Norwich School of painters.

Henry Ninham English landscape artist, engraver, and heraldic painter

Henry Ninham was an English landscape artist, engraver and heraldic painter. He and his father John Ninham belonged to the Norwich School of painters, a group of artists who all worked or lived in Norwich during all or part of their working lives from around 1800 to 1880. Along with the Norwich School artists John Thirtle and David Hodgson, he was the foremost recorder of Norwich's architectural heritage prior to the invention of photography.

Thomas Lound English landscape painter

Thomas Lound was an amateur English painter and etcher of landscapes, who specialised in depictions of his home county of Norfolk. He was a member of the Norwich School of painters, and lived in the city of Norwich all his life.

David Hodgson (artist) Professional English painter

David Hodgson was a professional English painter of landscapes and an active member of the Norwich School of painters. He was the son of the amateur artist Charles Hodgson, whom he accompanied on a tour of Wales in 1805, when he was seven. He was taught art by John Crome at Norwich Grammar School.

References

  1. Greenwich Theatre
  2. p.10, Brian Sewell. Roy Petley. (David Messum Fine Art, UK, 1994). ISBN   1-871208-59-9