Gear, William
William Gear belongs to the group of the most prominent British abstract painters of the second half of the 20th century.
He was born in Fife in Scotland in 1915 and spent most of his life in England. When he was barely 10 years of age his talent was recognised by his school teacher and in 1932 he won his school Dux Arts Medal.
William enrolled into the Edinburgh College of Art in 1932 where he learnt to draw in a classical way and was briefly taught by S.J. Peploe (1871-1935), the Scottish Colourist, and experienced the influence of his work. His main teachers in the college were Sir William Gillies, a renowned landscape painter, and John Maxwell (1905-1962) both of whom were great admirers of Paul Klee (1879-1940). They instilled this interest in William which was further supported by the Klee shows at the Scottish Society of Artists in Edinburgh in 1934 and the National Gallery in London in 1945. The other lasting influence on Gear’s work was Fernand Leger (1881-1955) with his black contours, strong colours and tone contrast with formal toughness.
In 1934 William participated in his first group show with the Society of Scottish Artists and at the Royal Scottish Academy. He won a postgraduate scholarship and visited Greece, Turkey, Italy, France and spent some time at Fernand Leger’s Academie in Paris in 1937.
When the Second World War started Gear was called up for military service as a Signals Officer serving in Egypt, Palestine, Syria, Cyprus and Italy managing to paint and exhibit in occasional group shows with his fellow officers in the places like Cabinet of Arts in Jerusalem and Galleria Michelangelo in Florence.
William served as an Officer at Monuments, Fine Arts, and Archives, the Allied program to protect the cultural property after the War, and settled in Paris in 1947 once demobilised. He visited Spain that summer where he saw paintings by El Greco (1541-1614) which made another lasting impression on his art.
While in Paris Gear met and befriended many British painters like Peter Lanyon (1918-1964) and Alan Davie (1920-2014) and got to know Nicolas de Staël (1914 – 1955) whom he greatly admired and members of Cobra Group such as Constant (1920 – 2005), Karel Appel ( 1921-2006) and Jean-Michel Atlan (1913-1960) who invited him to take part in several shows together.
In 1948 Gear had his first commercial solo show in London which was an immediate success and starred in a two-man show with Jackson Pollock (1912-1956) at Betty Parsons Gallery in New York in November 1949.
William moved to England in 1950 where his paintings were mentioned in the Times newspaper and snatched by collectors of the day. His Autumn Landscape was bought by the Arts Council from the Festival of Britain in 1951. This purchase caused lots of controversies but created huge publicity for the artist at the same time.
Gear experimented with silkscreen prints and fabric design was elected a member of the London Group and showed extensively in Britain, USA, South America and Japan in the 1950s.
In March 1958 William Gear was appointed Curator of Towner Art Gallery in Eastbourne. He held this position for six years and build one of the most extensive and interesting collections of his British contemporaries. His works were shown in a group show of seven British artists organised by the British Council toured Australia for over nine months. The Tate bought two Gear paintings in 1961.
From 1964 Gear was the Head of Fine Art at Birmingham College of Arts. The Arts Council organised his retrospective ‘William Gear: Paintings 1948-1968’ in 1969 and he was elected the Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts in1971.
After retiring from teaching in 1975 he devoted himself to his art entirely exhibiting in Britain and abroad. He was elected Royal Academician in 1995.
