John Nash (1893-1977)

John Nash CBE, RA (1893 – 1977) was a British painter, illustrator and printmaker. He was the younger brother of the artist Paul Nash.

John, like his brother served during the 1st World War and was an official war artist. During this time he developed his skill for landscape painting for which he is perhaps best known. He painted mainly in oils in this early part of his career and later in watercolour.

By the end of the 1st World War, Nash was also an accomplished printmaker and was a founder member of the Society of Wood Engravers that began in 1920. He worked with both wood engravings and woodcuts and illustrated literary periodicals and books such as Jonathan Swift’s Directions to Servants (Golden Cockerel Press, 1925) and and Edmund Spenser’s The Shepheardes Calendar (Cresset Press, 1930).

Nash also served in the 2nd World War and was an official war artist. In the mid-1940’s he began teaching at the Royal Academy of Arts and became a full member in 1951. His retrospective exhibition at the Royal Academy in 1967 was the first for a living painter.