INTRODUCTION BY BRIAN TILBROOK

TEMPTING PROVIDENCE

Brian Tilbrook I am currently looking forward to a ten week exhibition, October to early 2023, at the invitation of the University of Hong Kong's Museum and Art Gallery. All the work on display will have been borrowed back from individual owners and leading corporations. The exhibition will open in the year of my 90th birthday (which was in February). At the moment I am cogitating on whether to borrow two paintings which are on display in the Hong Kong Bank’s Art Gallery in London. Read more about the exhibition in this article in Post Magazine; as well as this introduction to my work by the Director of HK Uni Museum and Art Gallery.

My most recent retrospective exhibition was held in January 2019 at the kind invitation of the Hong Kong Arts Centre. Some 70 pieces of artwork were on display many of which were original paintings, but a large section was devoted to 30” x 20” photographic prints of my artwork . All my artwork can be reproduced as photographic prints if requested. I still regard myself as much a questing artist as I did 70 years ago at Art College. For many years I have used mixed media, a combination of acrylic spray, felt pen and paint.

Given the length of time spent as a painter and stage designer it is not surprising that my artwork is scattered all over the world. I have also reached the stage where the original owners’ offspring get in touch with me to find out the story behind the picture they have inherited.

The vast mural in the Hong Kong Club, truly wall to wall, continues to look down on an endless stream of club diners. A more recent mural was commissioned for a conference centre which looks down on Marina Bay with a stunning view of Singapore’s ever dramatic skyline. Some of my favourite murals are on display in Hong Kong but the transient nature of Hong Kong means that some artwork, like many buildings, come and go.

My exhibition in January 2019 benefited from the kind return of 2 paintings completed in 1967 in the jungles of Angkor Wat. This is the second time that artwork has been willed back to me. In the following pictures the completion dates range from 1948, when I was a schoolboy, to 2019.

Shades of Blue

I hope my paintings are of interest to a number of people, but especially those hundreds of students whom I taught in England, Malaysia and Hong Kong over many years. I tried to encourage them in both the appreciation and execution of artwork. They may not realise it but I saw them all as very special.

VIEW BRIAN TILBROOK'S RECENT ARTWORKS