Paul Feiler 1918 - 2013
Painter of non-figurative images in oils. Born in Frankfurt, he studied at the Slade School from 1936-39, with artists such as Patrick Heron, Bryan Wynter and Kenneth Armitage. As an enemy alien in 1939, although thoroughly anglicised, he was interned on the Isle of Man and then in Canada. On his return to England in 1941, he was an arts teacher at Eastbourne College, which had been evacuated to Radley College in Oxford.... read more
Painter of non-figurative images in oils. Born in Frankfurt, he studied at the Slade School from 1936-39, with artists such as Patrick Heron, Bryan Wynter and Kenneth Armitage. As an enemy alien in 1939, although thoroughly anglicised, he was interned on the Isle of Man and then in Canada. On his return to England in 1941, he was an arts teacher at Eastbourne College, which had been evacuated to Radley College in Oxford.
After World War II, he taught art in Bristol: he became the head of painting there in 1960. In 1975 he moved to the disused chapel in Kerris near Newlyn in Cornwall where he would live for the rest of his life.
He exhibited at the Redfern Gallery from 1933 to 1959, at the Royal Accademy from 1943 to 1972, and has shown in provincial and London galleries and abroad. His work is represented in collections including the Tate Gallery. Initially influenced by Cezanne and by his Cornish environment, in the mid 1960s connections with the landscape disappeared from his work and he worked, since then, with a restricted range of geometric forms.
Feiler’s skill with oil paint in particular is phenomenal. His use of the palette knife, smearing layer upon layer over the canvas surface is subtle, evocative and powerful.
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