GREEN, John Kenneth

1905 - 1986

John Kenneth Green was born at Hoddesdon, Hertfordshire on 25 February 1905, second child and eldest son of John Hazael Green (1855-1917), a bank clerk at the Bank of England, and his wife Murrulla Anne Caroline Luard née MacPherson (c1877-1933), who married at Marylebone, London in 1902. In 1911, young John was a 6 year old, living at Lock's Hill, South Street, Rochford, Essex with his parents 56 year old John, from Ilford, Essex and 31 year old Murrulla, from Sydney, New South Wales and his four siblings, Daphne Murlo 8, Angela Mary Alice 3, Michael Robert 3, all born at Hoddesdon and newly born daughter Jone Betty, who was born at Rochford and shortly afterwards they moved to Suffolk where young John spent his childhood. A friend and pupil of local landscape artist Harry Becker who, at his death, left Green some of his paintings. Educated at Christ's Hospital School, West Horsham and studied at Slade School of Fine Art 1922-1924, with a Slade Scholarship in 1923, under Henry Tonks (1862-1937). As a student he was commissioned to paint a portrait at Cambridge University which led to other commissions including composer Benjamin Britten, poet Cecil Day Lewis and actress Sybil Thorndike. A portrait and landscape painter and a wood-cut artist and had his first solo show at Arlington Gallery in 1928 and in the early 1930s visited America where he exhibited at Feragil Galleries, New York in 1934. Green worked at Glyndebourne Opera, 1935–1938 and was director of art at Wellington College, 1938–1945, designing scenery and costumes for the Sadler’s Wells productions and Britten’s Peter Grimes. A member of Chelsea Arts Club also exhibiting at the Royal Academy Summer Exhibition 1925–1957; New English Art Club; Royal Society of Portrait Painters and Royal Society of British Artists. Green held shows in Helsinki, Cairo and Geneva and there was a retrospective at Kettle's Yard, Cambridge, 1972. Green’s pictures were in the collections of the Contemporary Art Society and public galleries of Birmingham, Bradford, and Leeds. John Kenneth Green died at Sutton Hospital, Charterhouse, London EC1 on 13 May 1986.

Royal Academy Exhibits
from Westholme, Southwold, Suffolk
1925 1012 Professor J. E. Marr, FRS, Woodwardian Professor of Geology, University of Cambridge - pencil
from 3 Redcliffe Square, London
1930 33 Miss Murray Lambert
         1189 The Willow - chalk
from Wellington Cottage, Berkshire
1945 412 Mrs G. B. Stancliffe and Paul
         446 The Hill on Lynedoch, Wellington College

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Works by This Artist