Austin Osman Spare (30 December 1886 – 15 May 1956) was an English artist and occultist who worked as both a draughtsman and a painter. Influenced by symbolism and art nouveau his art was known for its positive use of line, and its depiction of horrendous and sexual imagery. In an occult capacity, he developed idiosyncratic magical techniques including automatic writing, automatic drawing and sigilization based on his theories of the relationship between the sentient and unconscious self.
Born into a working-class family in Snow Hill in London, Spare grew happening in Smithfield and subsequently Kennington, taking an early captivation in art. Gaining a scholarship to examination at the Royal College of Art in South Kensington, he trained as a draughtsman, while moreover taking a personal fascination in Theosophy and Occultism, becoming briefly working with Aleister Crowley and his A∴A∴. Developing his own personal occult philosophy, he wrote a series of occult grimoires, namely Earth Inferno (1905), The Book of Pleasure (1913) and The Focus of Life (1921). Alongside a string of personal exhibitions, he plus achieved much press attention for inborn the youngest entrant at the 1904 Royal Academy summer exhibition.
After publishing two short-lived art magazines, Form and The Golden Hind, during the First World War he was conscripted into the armed forces and worked as an attributed war artist. Moving to various vigorous class areas of South London higher than the gone decades, Spare lived in poverty, but continued exhibiting his bill to shifting degrees of success. With the introduction of surrealism onto the London art scene during the 1930s, critics and the press over took an raptness in his work, seeing it as an in advance precursor to surrealist imagery. Losing his house during the Blitz, he fell into relative mysteriousness following the Second World War, although he continued exhibiting till his death in 1956.
Spare’s spiritualist legacy was largely maintained by his friend, the Thelemite author Kenneth Grant in the latter allowance of the 20th century, and his beliefs not in the distance off from sigils provided a key influence on the chaos illusion movement and Thee Temple ov Psychick Youth. Spare’s art again began to receive attention in the 1970s, due to a renewed raptness in art nouveau in Britain, with several retrospective exhibitions being held in London. Books not quite Spare and his art have been written by Robert Ansell (2005), Phil Baker (2011) and others.
What do you think of the works of Austin Osman Spare?
Use the form below to say your opinion about Austin Osman Spare. All opinions are welcome!