Timothy Hyman RA Biography

Timothy Hyman was born in 1946. A graduate of the Slade School of Art (1967) he is a figurative painter, art writer and curator. He was elected a Royal Academician in 2011. Timothy has curated exhibitions at the Tate, ICA and Hayward galleries and to date had nine major solo exhibitions in London. A writer of numerous articles and publications he is an author and his most recent book is ‘The World New Made: Figurative Painting in the twentieth century’ which he launched at the Essential School of Painting 2016.

Hyman is best known for his narrative renditions of London. He draws his inspiration from artists like  Beckmann and Bonnard, as well as Lorenzetti and Brueghel. He also delves deeply, with startling honesty, into his personal relationship with his partner author Judith Ravenscroft and with London the city that he has a profound love for. He expresses himself and his feelings of where he sits in all this through vivid colours, shifting scale and perspectives thereby creating visionary works.

In 2003 Thames and Hudson published his monograph on Sienese Painting. Timothy has also written on the work of many artists including a critically acclaimed work on Pierre Bonnard. His publications also include more contemporary artists, such as Howard Hodgkin,  R.B. Kitaj and one of India’s change-maker artists  Bhupen Khakhar. He has been a regular contributor to the Times Literary Supplement  where a number of his writings have received wide appreciation for their in-depth and sentient prose. His subject matter has ranged from Ernst Ludwig Kirchner, Henry Darger to German Romanticism.

In 1980 and 1982, Hyman was a Visiting Professor at the Fine Art Faculty University of Baroda. He has had long term relationship with the Indian art scene going back to 1976, when he first met Bhupen Kharkar, to his visits to Baroda, present day Vadodara, where he met artists like one time Dean of Faculty and leading artist Ghulammohammed Sheikh.

He has been a visiting lecturer at the Slade, Glasgow School of Art, St. Michaels , The Royal College of Art  and was one of the founding teachers for The Royal Drawing School as well as lecturing at The Working Men’s College, The Tate, the National Gallery, London and MOMA in New York.

Timothy has been Artist in Residence at Lincoln Cathedral, Sandown Racecourse and, most recently, at Maggie’s Cancer Caring Centres; works from this latest residence were exhibited at the Royal Academy in 2015 and where he published his book Timothy Hyman: A Year With Maggie’s.

For Timothy Hyman’s complete CV click here.