Artist, teacher and editor, born in Plymouth, Devon, who gained a first-class honours degree, with commendation for thesis, at Wolverhampton Polytechnic, 1976–9, taught by Knighton Hosking and Colin Harrison, with a period at L’École des Beaux-Arts, Metz, France; his master’s in painting from the Royal College of Art, 1980–5, taught by Peter de Francia, Mario Dubsky, Ken Kiff and Frank Whitford; and his doctorate from the Faculty of Humanities there, 1987–91, with a thesis on Art on the Western Front, 1914–18. Among his awards were Wolverhampton Polytechnic drawing prizes, 1978 and 1979; the Royal College of Art Rodney Burn Memorial Prize and a Richard Ford, Royal Academy Major Travel Scholarship for research in the Prado, Madrid, both 1983; the Royal College Milner Kite Scholarship, 1985; and Penguin Book Prize for best thesis in humanities, Royal College, 1991.
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From graduation in 1985, he taught and exhibited throughout the United Kingdom, eventually becoming dean and professor of fine arts at Bristol Polytechnic (University of the West of England), 2000. Artists’ books for which Gough was fundraiser and editor included: Millennium Bestiary, 1995; A Consequential Coastline, 1996; and Sylva Brittanicus, 2001. His Stanley Spencer: Journey to Burghclere, plotting the creation of the World War I Sandham Memorial, was published by Sansom & Company in 2006. He was the recipient of a British Council travel award in 1999 and a Canadian government research grant in 2000. He carried out public commissions for British Army regiments, the Royal Marines, Ocean Trading and Pirelli. Gough was elected a member of the RWA, 1997, and a member of its council in 1999. Later group shows included A decade of miniature prints, Bankside Gallery, 1997; Smash and Grab, Victoria & Albert Museum, 1997; and The Discerning Eye, critic’s selection, Mall Galleries, 1999. Among his later solo exhibitions were 60 – images of Venerated Sites, Canadian War Museum, Ottawa, 1998–9, and Loci Memoriae, Watershed and Architecture Centre, Bristol, 2001, with an illuminating catalogue text by the artist. The Canadian War Museum, the Imperial War Museum and other military, public and corporate collections hold examples.
Text source: 'Artists in Britain Since 1945' by David Buckman (Art Dictionaries Ltd, part of Sansom & Company)
