John Morley Bury was born in Bournemouth and studied at Bournemouth College of Art 1937-9 and then Reading University 1939-40 before spending six years in the army. He returned to Reading in 1945 then attended Regent Street Polytechnic and Goldsmiths College. He taught part-time at Hornsey School of Art from 1958 until retirement in 1984. Bury lived in London but his interest in figure subjects in the 1950s changed to landscapes in the 1960s, landscapes “not real but a collection of seen ideas. Gradually texture of the paint became more important”. He wrote that “studies in the organisation of colour relationships and the optical qualities which create a sense of space” were important to him.
Mixed shows included New English Art Club, 1950; London Group and Daily Express Young Artists 1954; Vision and Reality, Wakefield City Art Gallery 1957; 3 Artists, South London Art Gallery 1961; Centaur Gallery, 1970; and The Forgotten Fifties, Graves Art Gallery, Sheffield and tour 1984. Bury was a member of the Artists International Association and also showed with Hampstead Artists’ Council, Zwemmer Gallery, Heal’s Mansard Gallery and Everyman Foyer, Hampstead where he had a series of solo exhibitions from 1960. Bury’s work is held by Tate Gallery (a self-portrait purchased from Zwemmer Gallery in 1958), Victoria and Albert Museum, Salford Art Gallery, Nuffield Foundation and various education committees plus Cambridge University. Corporate collections included ICI, Stavely Industries, Lintas and Rank Xerox.
