Stephen Farthing studied at St Martin's School of Art, London (1969-73) before taking his Masters Degree in Painting at the Royal College of Art, London (1973-76). Here he was awarded an Abbey Major Scholarship, taking him to The British School at Rome for a year from 1976. His teaching career began as a Lecturer in Painting at Canterbury College of Art (1977-79), after which he was a Tutor in painting at the Royal College of Art, London from 1980 to 1985. He went on to become Head of Painting (1985-87) and Head of Department of Fine Art (1987-89) at West Surrey College of Art and Design. From 1990 he was Ruskin Master at the Ruskin School of Fine Art and Professorial Fellow of St Edmund Hall, Oxford until 2000.
Stephen Farthing has exhibited extensively in one man shows since his first solo exhibition held at the Royal College of Art Gallery, London in 1977. His work, representing Britain, was shown at the Sao Paulo Biennale in 1989, leading to many further solo shows in the UK and abroad, including South America and Japan. He has also participated in many group exhibitions since 1975, including the John Moores Liverpool Exhibitions, in which he was a Prize Winner in 1976, 1980, 1982, 1987, 1991, 1993, 1997 and 1999. He was represented by The Edward Totah Gallery in London and New York until Edwards death in 1997.
Farthing was Artist in Residence at the Hayward Gallery, London in 1989. He was elected Royal Academician in 1998 and in 2000 was made an Emeritus Fellow of St Edmund Hall, Oxford. In 2000, Duckworth published The Intelligent Persons Guide to Modern Art. He was executive director of the New York Academy of Art from September 2000 until August 2004 when he was appointed Rootstein Hopkins Research Chair of Drawing at the University of Arts London, which he held until 2017. Stephen now lives and works in New York and London.
My mother was a school teacher, my father a hospital administrator and a brother two years older than me lived together in a small house in London SW18.
At school, I enjoyed English literature, art, rugby, and sailing. My brother Michael became a Gastroenterologist, then dean of a medical school and finally vice chancellor of a university. At the age of eighteen, I persuaded my parents to let me study painting at St Martin's School of Art. From there, I went to the Royal College of Art in South Kensington and then won a scholarship to study mural painting at the British Academy in Rome.
So, it was a natural progression into art and art history driven by a personal passion for the subject and a family with a strong moral compass and work ethic.
Read more on Stephen’s background here:
When I became a tutor on this course, I had been teaching in art schools, writing about art and art education and practicing as a professional fine artist for about 40 years. During the last twenty of those years, the internet, digital imaging, and information technology gradually became, in the every day life of both artists and scholars, more and more important. As a research professor and head of department during that time, I felt I needed to learn more about online learning. What better way to acquire this knowledge than to get some first-hand experience by becoming a tutor on this course.
Read more on Stephen’s background here:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stephen_Farthing
An enduring love for the objects and stories of art. The ability to trust both your intellect and your emotions. A strong desire to turn images and objects into words and ideas.
I don't have a favorite period, I find everything that I can usefully include in my story of art to be important.
It is however a fact that over time my focus on specific periods has changed, often for geographical reasons. When I lived in Paris, aged 25, I became very interested in Baroque portraiture, when I lived in Manhattan it was a good place to get to know American Abstraction, In London it was always, The Romantic Landscapes of Turner.
In Mexico City it was Frieda Khalo. Now living in Carthage in North Africa, it is the late Roman Mosaics in the Bardo museum.
I like it when students write with passion, when they remember that emotions are an important component of the making and understanding of our visual culture, when they experiment, have fun, and are not frightened to disagree with the opinions of others.
An important aspect of writing about our visual culture is not simply who made it but when it was made and what was going on in the world at that time.
Watch: Artists' Laboratory 02: The Back Story by Professor Stephen Farthing
The artists who have most influenced my thinking both as a student of art history and as an artist are in chronological order: Leonardo da Vinci (notebooks), Manet (his late paintings), Monet (The Waterlilies), Van Gogh (everything he did after his first two years of painting), and Jackson Pollock (his late drip paintings). Each one broke new ground, and each influenced my thinking in one way or another.
Check out how these artists have influenced Stephen’s own work here: The artist giving portraits their swagger back
Thinking I know the answer to the questions asked in an assignment - then having my understanding questioned or expanded upon by what I read in a student's essay.
If you are physically able, visit galleries and museums as often as you can always take a small notebook. On each visit spend time with just one or two objects or paintings that catch your eye, drawing and writing about what you are looking at will help your looking and understanding. Don't try you look at everything. Think of the gallery as a menu in a restaurant - order something that attracts you on the day - don't try to devour the entire menu.
Tate Britain Exhibition: Drawing from Turner
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