Hybrid - Graham Sutherland

Graham Vivian Sutherland (1903-1980) was born in Streatham, London, U.K.

Sutherland attended Epsom School and then studied art at Goldsmith’s School of Art (1921-26) where he quickly became a highly skilled etcher. While still a student, Sutherland established a reputation as a fine printmaker and commercial printmaking would become his main source of income throughout the late 1920s. His work was shown for the first time in 1923 at the Royal Academy, London, where he exhibited frequently until 1929. He taught at the Chelsea School of Art in London from 1928 to 1939, and abandoned engraving for painting in the early 1930s. Later, as an official War Artist, Sutherland depicted bomb damage in London, but it was during the period after the war that his reputation really started to grow.

Sutherland developed an overriding interest in natural forms and the balance/battle dichotomy of the natural world. The menacing threat of the unknown and the alien permeates throughout his imagery; he grew a fascination with the tension between opposites: beauty and ugliness, friendliness and menace. These clashes were highlighted through the instinctive mark-making of his ambiguous organic forms alongside the strident colouring of his well-balanced compositions.

Graham Sutherland was awarded the Order of Merit in 1960 and died in London in 1980.