Biography

Cyril Wilson was based in Dumfries & Galloway since the late 1940s following his service in the Army in North Africa during the Second World War. He had been involved with Gracefield Arts Centre since its early days: firstly as a member of the Dumfries & Galloway Fine Arts Society and as adviser to Painting Collection sub-committee of the Dumfriesshire Educational Trust.

Wilson’s work as a painter remains the outward and permanent sign of his exceptional creativity. Although, having for many years spent much of each year in Ibiza and therefore having missed out on the important Scottish exhibitions, he is not yet so widely recognised in Scotland as he ought to be, such recognition is surely long overdue. It must soon become obvious that here is an artist whose understanding of the power and significance of colour transcends-and also goes much deeper than–its importance as a decorative element in the painted image. He was an artist whose inner eye was always active in attempting to penetrate beneath the visible surface of things; whose ability to meld together form, colour and linear rhythm and energy in a way that belies mere representation should be obvious to the perceptive viewer.