Biography

Peter Howson is a contemporary Scottish artist and leading figure of the Scottish figurative painting movement of the 1980s. His work is characterized by its grotesquely caricatured figures, often featuring nude and muscular men engaging in the controversial, violent subject matter. Influences include traditional graphic illustration and printmaking, as well as German and British figurative painters such as Francis Bacon and Johannes Grützke. Born in London, England on March 27, 1958, he went on to study at the Glasgow School of Art. Howson drew from his own life to inform his work, channeling his firsthand experiences with mental illness and war through haunting and hyperviolent images that can be, at times, hard to look at. He notably served as Britain’s official war artist during the 1993 Bosnian Civil War, traveling and documenting the horrors of armed conflict, with his paintings regularly appearing in the London Times. Howson is the recipient of numerous honors and awards for his contributions to the visual arts, notably including his appointment as an Officer of the Order of the British Empire in 2009 and the widespread reproduction of his images on a 1998 British postage stamp.