John Holt Biography
John Holt was born near
Manchester in 1949. After leaving school he attended Stockport College of Art to
study advertising and graphic design. Having completed the final year of his
degree at Salford College of Art, John was awarded the prestigious Bursary Award
from the highly acclaimed Royal Society of Arts.
After graduating in 1973 John embarked upon a career in advertising. Working as
an art director he designed and illustrated books for the European market. It
was during this time that he became increasingly inspired by Spanish and French
post-impressionist painters. His love of fine art grew as he visited local and
national art exhibitions and he discovered a great affection for the
Fauvist masters, Matisse and Braque.
John has had numerous group and one-man exhibitions both in the UK and abroad.
He has gained an enviable reputation for his dazzling Provencal landscapes, café
scenes, hill towns and harbour reflections. He deliberately exaggerates the
strong sunlight and deep shadows in his studies to evoke the warmth of the
Mediterranean. Bright oranges, yellows and luminous greens vie with bluish
mauves and maroon tinged purples in his pastel works with an even stronger glow
from John’s oil paintings.
While John’s impressionistic style and use of colour has great exuberance the
subject matter is nothing if not laid back! His work has been welcomed into the
market with great enthusiasm. The phenomenal demand for his original pastels and
oils has resulted in an extensive publishing programme of his superb limited
edition prints and dazzling original silk-screens. He has also been recognised
by the industry; he was nominated as Best Up-and-Coming Artist in both 1999 and
2000 by the Fine Art Trade Guild.
“I have worked at giving my paintings a very special warmth of their own. As
well as being evocations of particular places, my work is related to abstract
ideas, executed in slabs of rich colour and texture.”