John Blackburn

John Blackburn was born in Bedfordshire, England in 1932 and studied textile design at Maidenhead Art School in the early 1950s. After serving in the Royal Air Force he ventured to the South Pacific, where he met his New Zealand wife.

After nearly a decade in New Zealand, by the time Blackburn returned to his native England in 1961 he was arguably the most radical painter working in Auckland. Strangely, there is not a paragraph in New Zealand art history about him, besides his inclusion as one of ten artists at the Auckland City Art Gallery in November 1959. Colin McCahon, who selected the artists for this exhibition, spotted Blackburn’s work at his first solo exhibition at Auckland’s short-lived Circle Gallery. Local entrepreneur Les Harvey (responsible for developing Parnell village) was taken by Blackburn’s uncompromisingly abstract paintings and recognising his promise, acquired a large collection of works in exchange for tickets to Britain for the artist and his young family.