- James Henry Govier
James Henry Govier (
August 1 ,1910 –December 21 ,1974 ) was an English painter born atOakley, Buckinghamshire .He was the only son of Henry Govier and Mary Ann Measey. In 1914 the family moved to the small town of
Gorseinon on the Gower coast in South Wales, where James was educated at the local school. At the age of fourteen he left school to work in one of the local tin works. At the age of seventeen he became an evening student at theSwansea Art School . James was taken to seeGrant Murray , the head of Art at the famous Swansea Art School, and at the age of twenty gained the Glamorgan County Scholarship to study fulltime at Swansea Art School. From 1930, James came under the influence of Grant Murray. James and exhibited with many Welsh artists, includingAlfred Janes ,Ceri Richards andKenneth Hancock . In 1935 he exhibited with past students at theGlynn Vivian Art Gallery in Swansea.From 1935 James studied at the
Royal College of Art under the tutorship ofMalcolm Osborne , RA, RE. At this time he became an acquaintance of the poetDylan Thomas , and worked with other Welsh artists in London. In 1938 he gained his ARCA along with the Art Travelling Scholarship, which he was unable to take up because of the outbreak of war. From 1938 he worked as Malcolm Osborne’s assistant at the Royal College, and also helpedRobert Austin 1940-1942.In August 1940 he joined the Royal Engineers constructing gun emplacements and in the development of chemical warfare. In 1942 by order of the Air Ministry he was transferred to he Royal Air Force model making section for North Africa and Italy, producing models for the Dambuster raids, the D-Day landings and objectives in Africa and Italy.
James was demobilised in 1945 and started to exhibit with the Aylesbury and District Art Society, becoming an acquaintance of the Society’s patron
Augustus John . In 1947 he became Art Master at Eye Grammar School in Suffolk and resided in Eye until his marriage in 1950. In 1950 he married Freda Muriel Tye of Hoxne, a student at Ipswich Art School specialising as a commercial display artist. The couple started married life in Hoxne and moved to ‘The Retreat’, a large thatched house in Hoxne in 1957. James continued to exhibit with the Aylesbury Art Society and Ipswich Art Club.In 1965 the Eye Grammar School closed and James moved to
Diss Grammar School until his early retirement in 1972. James continued to produce oils and watercolours of East Anglia, including many genre subjects.James Henry Govier died on
December 21 ,1974 , leaving behind him a large variety of works from small, delicate pencil drawings and etchings to vibrant oils and translucent watercolours. Some of his canvasses are almost impressionistic in style, capturing the quality of the chiaroscuro he so frequently used.James Henry Govier’s works can be seen at The
National Museum of Wales ;National Library of Wales ; TheGlynn Vivian Art Gallery /Swansea Art Gallery ;Swansea Art Society ;The British Museum ;Ashmolean Museum , Oxford;Christchurch Mansion , Ipswich;Norwich Castle Museum andBuckinghamshire County Museum
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