Article relating to an individual, 2012
Published by: Guardian
Year published: 2012
Number of pages: 1

Full page feature on painter Frank Bowling, that appeared on page 18 of the g2 section of the Guardian newspaper of 3 July 2012. The feature was illustrated with a colour portrait of Bowling, taken by Martin Godwin. The feature was not titled as such, but two quotes were highlighted. ‘There were lots of fights’, and, in smaller but equally bold type, ‘Everyone was expecting me to paint some kind of protest art. For a while,I fell for it’. The text is introduced with, “He graduated from art school second only to David Hockney - and then gave up on the British art scene. Frank Bowling talks to Laura Barnett about pigeonholes, prejudice, and why he’s still waiting for that really big show”

In the article, Bowling recalls different episodes of his life, and expresses frustration at the Tate’s apparent timidity in not yet giving him a major retrospective. From the text: “Bowling was close to Hockney while at the Royal College; the two artists would go drinking together, and then fast (“for two weeks, we ate only apples and oranges and the odd bowl of rice”). They remain friends. Lucien Freud was another early mentor. “He’d go out of his way to encourage me,” Bowling says. “He’d often drop by - but that didn’t last much past the time I stopped doing figurative painting.”

Later in the text, “Despite his increasing frailty (he has diabetes and chronic back pain, and needs help to get to the further parts of his canvases), Bowling still paints everyday. Naturally, he is pleased by the recent resurgence of interest: six exhibitions so far this year, while the Royal Academy has just published a monograph of his work. “It feels,” he says, “just like the first five years I spent in New York - the working, and writing, and toing and froing from London. I’ve never felt this interest in my work quite as intensely.” And he gives the broad smile of an artist very happy to be rediscovered.”