Biography

Spontaneity is something which many people strive for. Playfulness is something we forget in the serious business of being an adult. Effortless movement is a thing of beauty. Willi Soukop worked all three of these virtues into his sculptures(rendered in stone, wood, metal and clay)and paintings over the years, as well as living by them himself. Summing up his life he said, “My life was never planned, it just happened” and “I haven’t stopped playing”. It is perhaps no wonder that those who collect Soukop’s work are so passionate about him, the experimental and often surprising qualities found in his pieces are captivating ,and unlike much sculpture and abstraction which can veer into alienating and remote, there is a quality to Soukop which makes his work comforting and accessible.

Willi Soukop (born Wilhelm Josef Soukop) was a natural talent, so as well as the normal state school education, he became a student of drawing by night and engraver by day. He eventually saved enough money to put himself through the Academy of Fine Art in Vienna where he studied under the watchful eyes of tutors such as H. Bitterlich and J. Muellner.

He left Austria in 1934 when he met an English woman who gave him the opportunity of moving to England, and from an outside perspective, he never looked back. This initial move took him to Dartington Hall, Devon, where he stayed until 1940. Soukop was however not the only European to find sanctuary at Dartington, for example at one time the entire Jooss Ballet from Germany was there, as was Michael Chekhov and his drama school. Individuals such as Bernard Leach and his son David, the celebrated potter, with whom Soukop formed a lasting friendship and who taught him the art of pottery also stayed for sometime. Another friendship in 1937 was with the artist and gallery-owner Eardley Knollys, whose Storran Gallery gave Soukop his first one-man show in 1938.

Other influences on Soukop came from friendships with the artists Cecil Collins and Heine Heckroth, the latter producing designs for many films of Michael Powell, including The Red Shoes. It was at this time, through an American artist Mark Tobey, that he met the beautiful French dancer Simone Moser, whom he eventually married and who was to become one of his greatest inspirations. Many attribute the inherent grace found in many of Soukop’s pieces to his wife’s dancing ability, something with which he was utterly captivated.

Like many artists, Soukop was also an excellent teacher and one of his first posts was as the Art Master at Blundell's School where he set up a new sculpture department (the calibre of which was so good the work was shown regularly in London).The pull of the city was powerful though and he soon left teaching in the provinces for a position in the city, first at Guildford School of Art in 1945 before moving to Chelsea School of Art where he remained until 1972. It was here that he taught artists such as Dame Elizabeth Frink in sculpture. In 1969 he accepted the additional position of Master of Sculpture at the Royal Academy Schools and became a member of the faculty for the British School in Rome.

He first exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1935 marked the beginning of a long relationship between institution and artist - he was elected an Associate (ARA) in 1963 and a full member (RA) in 1969.To date his work is held in public collections throughout the country at institutions such as the Royal Academy and Tate Collections. He won numerous awards and acclaim during his career but remained unassuming despite them. It seems that he was a man who was dedicated to producing works of great beauty and harmony for the love of it.