John Holmwood
Born in Wellington, John Holmwood studied and taught at the Wellington Technical College. After the war, in Auckland, he was more active with his own painting. When Eric Westbrook became Director of the Auckland City Art Gallery in 1952, his works were acquired and regularly included in the Gallery's exhibitions of contemporary N.Z painting. In 1957 Holmwood had a solo exhibition at the Architectural Centre Gallery in Wellington, was elected President of the ASA in the early 1970s. In 1976, John Holmwood was forced to stop painting when his eyesight suddenly deteriorated. The Auckland Society of Arts held a retrospective exhibition of his work in 1984 that included works from 1946 to 1976, and showed the wide range of his paintings. Ranging from the destruction of the bush - a popular subject of the 1950s - to depicting Auckland's foreshore at Orakei or witty, humorous genre works, Holmwood often employed strong colours and experimented with a variety of styles. His ability to make the viewer smile is self evident in works like "Circus Ground"1952 and "Beresford Jive" 1956 (illustrated pg 43 & 45 Art New Zealand No 31 "John Holmwood Thirty Years of His Painting")
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