Hans Schwarz (1922–2003), painter, sculptor, illustrator and author was born in Vienna and died in Greenwich,London. He was reticent about his early years and the influences on his life and art. He rarely spoke about his life experiences: as a child of Jewish heritage in pre-war Vienna; being sent to safety in England on the Kindertransport; as an interned ‘enemy alien’ on the Isle of Man; the support and encouragement given to study art by the Cadbury family; his experience in the post-war artistic milieu; his political and social views; and most importantly his vision as an artist. This biography attempts to pull all these strands together using archive material, anecdotal information from family and friends and analysis of his art considering the many works that are in public collections and the wealth of material which forms part of his studio collection. Hans Schwarz was an artist who could not spend a day in which he didn’t paint, so there is a wealth of material from which to draw and Paul Upton has endeavoured to select from the whole of Schwarz’s oeuvre.
Paul Upton trained to be an architect in the 1960s but then pursued a career in education, returning to architectural conservation in 1997. He has spent most of his life in Somerset and lives on the Quantock Hills, not far from Schwarz’s Stogursey house. His interest in Schwarz was awakened when he provided a home in the harbour town of Watchet for the large collection of his work brought from his studio in Greenwich. Also by Paul Upton: Hans Schwarz in Somerset – The people and places he painted whilst at his Stogursey home.
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