William Crozier was born in Glasgow in 1930 and educated at the Glasgow School of Art between 1949 and 1953. On graduating he moved to London where he established his reputation at the forefront of his contemporaries through solo exhibitions at the ICA, Drian, Tooth, Serpentine, Scottish and Bruton Galleries. From the mid-1950s onwards, Crozier spent long periods living in Dublin and Paris, followed by a period in southern Spain which was to prove central to his development as an artist. He has represented the UK and Ireland overseas, and has been awarded the Premio Lissone. In 1991 the Crawford Art Gallery Cork and the Royal Hibernian Academy curated a large retrospective of his work. He was elected to Aosdana in 1992 and is an honorary member of the Royal Hibernian Academy.
Several films have been made about Crozier and his work, work, such as ‘The Truth about a painter’ directed by Cian O hEigertaigh for RTE in 1993 and ‘The Frame: Jane Bown photographs William Crozier’ for Meridian UK in 2000. Crozier’s work features in all major reference works on Irish and Scottish Art. Crozier’s work can be seen in the major public and private collections in these islands, as well as in the national galleries of Canada, Poland and Australia and major corporate collections such as the Allied Irish Banks and BNP Paribas.
Selected Solo Exhibitions
1951 Carnegie Library, Ayr, Scotland
1957 The Parton Gallery, London
1957 The Institute of Contemporary Arts, London
1957, 1958,
1960, 1961, 1962, 1965,1969, 1970 The Drian Gallery, London
1958 Galerie Blu, Milan
The Artists’ International Association, London
1959, 1962, 1963, 1964, Arthur Tooth & Sons, London
1960 Galerie Madeleine, Paris
1961 Arnolfini Gallery, Bristol
1962 Traverse Gallery, Edinburgh
1964 New Charing Cross Gallery, Glasgow
1968, 1983 Richard Demarco Gallery, Edinburgh
1975 Compass Gallery, Glasgow
1978 Serpentine Gallery, London
1980 Swiss Cottage Library Gallery, London
1983 Brompton Gallery, London
1985 Maclaurin Gallery, Ayr and tour; Angela Flowers Gallery, Cork
Scottish Gallery, Edinburgh
1986 Galeria del Ayuntamiento, La Coruña
Museo Conde Duque, Madrid
1989 Scottish Gallery, London
1990 Crawford Gallery, Cork
Drian Gallery, London
National Gallery, Gdansk, Poland
1991 RHA Gallagher Galleries Dublin
Taylor Gallery, Dublin
1994 William Jackson Gallery, London
1995, 1996 Bruton Gallery, London
1997 Galerie St Jacques, Brussels
1998 Graphic Studio Gallery, Dublin
Taylor Gallery, Dublin
2002 Fenton Gallery, Cork
Scottish Gallery, Edinburgh
2004 Taylor Gallery, Dublin
Curated Group Exhibitions
1961, 1963, 1964, 1982 John Moores, Liverpool
1962 New Directions, Manchester City Art Gallery
1963 British painting in the 60s Whitechapel Art Gallery, London
1964 + Thirty: Contemporary Scottish Painting Scottish Arts Council, Edinburgh
1968 National Gallery of Canada
1969 English Landscape in the 20th Century Camden Arts centre, London
1974 British Figurative Art Today Copenhagen
Hertzlandschaften International galerie Stein, Cologne
Body and Soul Walker Art gallery, Liverpool
1977 Expressionism Scottish Arts Council, Edinburgh
1978 Painters in Parallel Scottish Arts Council, Edinburgh
Muzeum Narodowe, Warsaw
1981 Fragments Against Ruin Arts Council of Great Britiain
1983 British Art: New Directions Puck Building, New York
1985 Another View of Ireland Seven Dials Gallery, London
Cork Art Now Crawford Gallery, Cork
1990 Contemporary Artists from Ireland Austin Desmond Gallery, London
1994 The Oireachtas exhibition, Dublin (gold medal for painting)
The Colourist Tradition City Art Gallery, Edinburgh
1995 Irish Masters Washington, Philadelphia and New York
2002- An Leabhar Mor: The Great Book of Gaelic Gallery of Modern Art, Glasgow, Smithsonian Institute, Washington DC, and tour
Awards
1960 Premio Lissone, Milan
1979 Visiting Fellowship, New York Studio School, New York
1987 Professor Emeritus, Winchester School of Art, UK
1992 Elected member, Aosdana
1994 Gold medal for Painting, The Oireachtas, Dublin
2000 Elected Honorary member, Royal Hibernian Academy
Selected Bibliography
Oggi October 1958 p.3
M.Ragon ‘Huit Jours à Londres’ in Cimaise no 54, 1961 Juillet. P.74
M.Shepherd ‘William Crozier’ in Art News August 1961 p.5-6
D.Irwin ‘Scotland 1964’ in Apollo May 1964 pp. 414-418
H.Read ‘Contemporary British Art’ London 1964
N.Ackroyd ‘An Etcher on Etching’ in Studio International June 1972 p.275
E.Gage ‘The Eye in the Wind’ London 1978
C.Parry-Crooke (ed) ‘Contemporary British Artists’ London 1979
I.Kirkwood ‘Interview with William Crozier’ in Artlog No 6, London 1979
M.Green ‘William Crozier’ Art Monthly November 1983 no 71 p.13-14
V.Ryan ‘Cork Art Now’ Crawford Art Gallery, Cork, 1985 pp20 –24 passim.
M. Von Joel ‘Interview with William Crozier’ in Artline No.7 special supplement with notes by the artist. July 1989 vol 4
A.Whooley ‘Belt of a Crozier’ Cork Examiner. 3.5.91
B.Fallon ‘Scottish Painter coloured by France’ Irish Times 2.8.90
W.Crozier ‘William Crozier on Howard Hodgkin’ in Modern Painters Winter 1990
W,Crozier ‘Scotland’ in Irish Independent’ nd.
K.Hartley ‘Scottish Art since 1900’ National Galleries of Scotland/Lund Humphreys 1990
B.Fallon ‘William Crozier’ in Irish Arts Review Yearbook 1993
W.Crozier ‘Art that marked me’ in Irish Times 8.2.02
M.Hartigan ‘Scenes from the heart’ in Sunday Tribune 30.6.02
P.Croft ‘Stone Lithography’ A & C Black, London 2002 p.45
(various) ‘An Leadhar Mor. The Great Book of Gaelic’ Cannongate Edinburgh. 2002
B.McAvera ‘William Crozier’ in Irish Arts Review Spring 2003
W.Crozier ‘My Day’ in Artists and Illustrators May/June issue 2003
Mullan Gallery www.mullangallery.com
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