Gerald Laing | |
|---|---|
| Born | Gerald Ogilvie-Laing (1936-02-11)11 February 1936 Newcastle upon Tyne, England |
| Died | 23 November 2011(2011-11-23) (aged 75) Kinkell, Scotland |
| Education | Berkhamsted School |
| Alma mater | Royal Military Academy Sandhurst Saint Martin's School of Art |
| Occupations | Artist, sculptor |
| Spouses | |
| Children | 6 |
Gerald Ogilvie-Laing (11 February 1936 – 23 November 2011) was a British pop artist and sculptor.[1] He lived in theScottish Highlands.[2]
Laing was born inNewcastle upon Tyne on 11 February 1936, a son of Maj. and Mrs. Gerald Ogilvie-Laing[3] He grew up duringWorld War II and experienced theBattle of Britain as young boy.
He was educated atBerkhamsted School, an independent school inBerkhamsted,Hertfordshire,[4] and attended theRoyal Military Academy Sandhurst and served with theRoyal Northumberland Fusiliers as alieutenant in Ireland and Germany. He moved on from the military and attendedSaint Martin's School of Art in London.[5] "I loved Sandhurst because in its own terms it was perfect. It was quite hard, quite arcane, but it worked incredibly well. But I found the army incredibly boring and unsatisfactory. It just wasn't perfect any more."[6]
At the beginning of the 1960s, while still at Saint Martin's, Laing was introduced to artists in New York City, meetingAndy Warhol,Roy Lichtenstein,James Rosenquist, andRobert Indiana.[7] After art school he moved to New York, and his art career began to take off.[8]
Laing's career took him from the avant-garde world of 1960spop art, through minimalist sculpture, followed by representational sculpture and then back full circle to his pop art roots. He also taught sculpture at theUniversity of New Mexico and atColumbia University in New York City.[9]
In 1993 theFruitmarket Gallery inEdinburgh staged a retrospective exhibition of his work.[10]
In 2012 Sims Reed Gallery staged an exhibition of his prints and multiples, his most comprehensive show of work to date.
Laing did a series of anti-war paintings, based primarily on photographs from the atrocities atAbu Ghraib. These paintings were the beginning of his return to pop art. They were followed in 2004 by a series ofAmy Winehouse paintings, as well as a painting ofVictoria Beckham andKate Moss.
On 19 February 2012 a bronze sculpture by Laing,Dreamer, was stolen fromKelvingrove Art Gallery and Museum inGlasgow.[11]
In February 2014, Laing's Brigitte Bardot painting from 1963 work sold for £902,500 in an auction at Christie's in London, a record sum for the artist.[12]
Sims Reed Gallery represents the Estate of Gerald Laing.[13]
Laing was married three times and was the father of six children.[8] In 1962, he married Jennifer Anne Redway, with whom he had one daughter. They divorced in 1967 and he married Galina Vassilovna Golikova, with whom he had two sons, in 1969.[4]
They divorced in 1983 and in 1988, Laing was married to Adaline HavemeyerFrelinghuysen at the Episcopal Church of the Heavenly Rest in New York by the Rev. C. Hugh Hildesley. Adaline, a graduate from theMadeira School, attendedSarah Lawrence College and was a daughter of formerU.S. RepresentativePeter Frelinghuysen Jr. and the former Beatrice Sterling Procter, an heir to theProcter & Gamble fortune.[16] Adaline, with whom he had two more sons, is the sister ofRodney Frelinghuysen, also a former U.S. Representative, and a granddaughter of the prominent New Jersey lawyer and bankerPeter Hood Ballantine Frelinghuysen I.[9] Laing fathered his sixth child with Alison Urquhart in 2002.
In 1968, Laing and his second wife foundKinkell Castle in theBlack Isle ofRoss and Cromarty,[17] " a Z-plan stronghold that was the former seat of theclan Mackenzie, ruinous and in the hands of local farmer Angus MacDonald." Gerald paid £5,000 for it and spent the remainder of his life nurturing it into a family home, studio and workshop.[18][19]
Laing died on 23 November 2011 at his home,Kinkell Castle.[8] His son Farquhar (b. 1970), the elder son from Gerald's second marriage, is the founder and director of the Black Isle Bronze foundry, "one of Europe's foremost bronze caster" and another son, Sam Ogilvie, owns Ogilvie Design Studio,[19] which designs bespoke sculptural furniture and does commercial interior design work.[20]
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