Stephen Farthing

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 until 2000 he was Ruskin Master at the Ruskin School of Fine Art and Professorial Fellow of St Edmund Hall.

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 Edward’s 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. In 2000, Duckworth published his first book, An Intelligent Person’s Guide to Modern Art, and since then he has gone on to edit and write a number of essentially art historical texts mostly in relation to painting and drawing. 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. He currently lives and works in Mexico City and London.