Born in British Guyana, Frank Bowling belongs to the generation of British artists that came of age in the sixties. After graduating from the Royal College of Art in 1962, along with David Hockney and R. B. Kitaj, he, like Hockney, found his artistic identity in America.

Unlike Hockney's, however, Bowling's art is rooted in abstraction owing to the abstract expressionist tradition of Mark Rothko. Vigorously dripping and pouring paint in lustrous accretions, he creates texturally complex paintings in which he plays with structure through collaged and brightly painted shapes. He was elected in 2005 as the first black member of England's Royal Academy.
Bowling moved in 1950 to England, where he fulfilled his National S...