NOTES ON THE ARTWORK
The paintings, drawings and three-dimensional pieces you see here are a fraction of the work of English artist Barrie Huntbach (1935 – 2006).
The earliest work shown, and in existence, is his 1971 mural at Portslade Town Hall, ‘The Return of the Prodigal Son’; the last an untitled pen and ink drawing he made on 13th November 2006, the day before he died aged 71.
Signature on work
Not all works are signed; on the paintings this usually indicates the work is either unfinished or rejected.
Those signed are as B. S Huntbach (less frequently, Barrie S Huntbach or BSH) some works are signed on the reverse.
B. S Huntbach becomes his preferred title in documents relating to his work as an artist e.g. in Society of Catholic Artist literature.
From the mid-1980s he became known to immediate family as Baz.
Early, missing or destroyed work
The works represent here are a tiny percentage of what he produced in his lifetime, as he destroyed much over the years. Also lost are the thousands of sketch drawings he made continually throughout his life; these he always tore up and threw away (the few that survive are shown)
Very few paintings exist from the early 1970s, none prior to this date. The earliest surviving photograph (text on reverse: ‘In the Garden 1958’) shows B S Huntbach aged 23 working on a figurative painting in the garden of 50 St. Andrew’s Road, Portslade.
Dates of work
B. S Huntbach never dated his work after the early 1970s
Titles of work
B S Huntbach did not attach importance to titles and generally only titled works if they were to be exhibited or if people asked for one.
Quote: “It is not always possible to give a piece of art an exact title. After all a title is only the shadow of a complex idea. A piece of art should speak for itself”
(Ref: text for the Rottingdean exhibition 1995)
Medium: the paintings
In the 1970s and 1980s B. S Huntbach worked in water-based acrylics but towards the end of the 80s and for the remainder of his life he worked in oil paints. Earlier pieces are on plywood board, later on canvas or canvas glued to board.
Medium: the drawings
Pen and ink on paper
Medium: the three-dimensional work
Various, some cast in resin others modelling clay
Exhibitions
May 1976
‘Two points of View’, St. Leonard’s Church, Hove
November 1978
Arts Exhibitions, Arundel Castle
October 1979
12 x England
Museum of Modern Religious Art, Ostend
1980
Clifton Cathedral Church of St Peter and Paul
July 1981
‘Visions of Love’, Chichester Centre of Arts
July 1984
‘The Eye and the Cross’ (SCA) Arundel Cathedral
May & June 1985
International Exhibition of Religious Art, Holy Trinity Church, Bath (Bath Fringe Festival)
October 1985
Chatfield, Church Lane, Steyning ‘Exhibition of Paintings in Aid of Yobe’
August 1989
Argile Gallery, London one-man show
September 1991
‘Images of Faith’ Worthing Museum & Art Gallery
May ?
‘Unorthodox Approaches’ (Brighton Festival) Chapel Royal, Brighton (SCA)
May 1994
‘Hands Together’ (Brighton Festival) Chapel Royal, Brighton (SCA)
August 1995
The Grange Rottingdean
June 1997
‘A Sense of Unity’, St. Leonard’s Church, Hove
Date?
‘Downland Images’, Foredown Tower Countryside Centre
May 2000
‘Art at the Chapel’, Chapel Royal Brighton, (SCA) Brighton Festival
May 2001
‘A Christian Odyssey’ Chapel Royal Brighton, (SCA)
July – September 2002
‘Creation’, (SCA) Ditchling Museum