Patrick Procktor RA Hon. RWS

1936 - 2003

orn in Dublin, the younger son of an oil company executive, Patrick Procktor moved to London aged four, when his father died. After working in a builders' merchants and being conscripted into the Royal Navy to undertake National Service, where he learned Russian, he worked as a Russian interpreter with the British Council. Drawing and painting in his spare time, Procktor was accepted into the Slade in 1958, with William Coldstream and Keith Vaughan as tutors. His first one-man show was at the Redfern Gallery in 1963, its success confirming him as one of the bright young stars of Pop Art and popular culture, alongside David Hockney, Lucian Freud, Peter Blake and Bridget Riley. Procktor designed a record sleeve for Elton John and contributed to Blake's cover for The Who's "Face Dances". Procktor was made an Honorary Member of the Royal Watercolour Society, and in 1996 was elected to the Royal Academy. Among his many commitments as an artist and illustrator, in 1989-90, Proctor was kind enough to work on the book, "Visions of Venice". In 1999, he was forced to move from his much-loved Manchester Square flat, following a fire.