Noel Forster

{{short description|English painter}}

{{Use dmy dates|date=April 2022}}

Noel Armstrong Forster (15 June 1932 – 7 December 2007) was a British artist who trained at King's College Newcastle a part of Durham University, graduating in 1957.

Forster was born in Seaton Delaval, Northumberland and attended to Gosforth Grammar School.{{cite news |url=https://www.theguardian.com/culture/2008/jan/08/obituaries.mainsection |title=Noel Forster Obituary |work=The Guardian |date=2008-01-08 |accessdate=2008-10-25 | location=London | first=Bernard | last=Cohen}}

He married Eileen Conlon in 1962, later having three sons with her. In due course he became Principal lecturer in Painting at the Chelsea College of Art & Design in Chelsea as well as Artist-in-Residence and Supernumerary Fellow at Balliol College Oxford University. In 1978 he won the John Moores Painting Prize{{Cite web |url=http://www.liverpoolmuseums.org.uk/walker/johnmoores/previouswinners/noel_forster.asp |title=John Moores Prize |access-date=2009-03-27 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20121009095501/http://www.liverpoolmuseums.org.uk/walker/johnmoores/previouswinners/noel_forster.asp |archive-date=2012-10-09 |url-status=dead }} His art can best be described as abstract, colourful and usually involving a cross-weaved fabric of straight or curved parallel lines drawn by hand, often executed in oil on linen. He died in London.

"Noel was in my view the most important post-War abstract painter in England, and his work combined performance, intellectual rigour and the artist's craft. It was simultaneously clever and sensuous. He was an influential teacher too and a very gifted musician. But he was also larger than life." [https://archive.today/20070718205750/http://britishlibrary.typepad.co.uk/breakingtherules/2007/12/for-noel.html Stephen Bury, Curator, British Library, 8 December 2007]

"Noel was a splendid friend, and a wonderful painter.He thought endlessly about the relations of paint and light, and talked with extraordinary clarity - and complexity - about making works of art. He taught me a lot about looking.The ideas behind his own work were intricate and uncompromising."

http://www.noelforster.co.uk AS Byatt, Author, Dec 2007

"Noel Forster was an adventurous and productive artist whose glowing, audacious personality looked out from his canvasses."

[http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/obituaries/article3199501.ece Obituary in The Times, 17 January 2008]{{dead link|date=January 2025|bot=medic}}{{cbignore|bot=medic}} Bernard Cohen, Artist, Dec 2007