About the artist
John Egerton Christmas Piper was born December 1903 in Epsom, Surrey. He was educated at Epsom College and went on to be trained at Richmond School of Art and the Royal college of Art in Kensington.
His early works were more abstract, but his style became more naturalistic in the late 1930s. Piper was an official war artist in World War II and also undertook work for the 'Recording Britain' project, recording sites that were at risk of damage from bombing or neglect.
As well as painting, Piper is renowned for his stained glass work which can be seen at Coventry Cathedral, Liverpool Metropolitan Cathedral and churches in Lichfield, Wolverhampton and Bristol amongst others. His tapestries hang in Chichester, Hereford and Llandaff (Cardiff) cathedrals.
Piper also designed fabrics for Sandersons, ceramics and dust jackets for books . He collaborated in the Shell Guide series of guidebooks.
About the work
Piper was commissioned in 1980 to paint three paintings of buildings, which originally hung on the South wall of The Great Hall, between the glass doors. They were later moved to the boardroom.
The paintings portray Buckden Palace and St Mary's church in Cambridgeshire, Conisbrough Castle in Yorkshire and Saint David's Cathedral in Pembrokeshire. The latter illustrating the fact that the Institute covers Wales as well as England.
The Chair of the Great Hall art works commissioning committee, Kenneth Manterfield, reportedly picked Buckden as a subject simply because they were buildings he walked past frequently and liked, perhaps during his time as a student at Queens' College, Cambridge University. Manterfield was born in Sheffield, around 16 miles from Conisbrough Castle. We may speculate that he also holidayed in Pembrokeshire!
British Gas made a donation of £3,000 to purchase the Buckden Abbey painting as a gift for the ICAEW's centenary. Christies Contemporary Art screen printed 100 copies of each Piper and these were sold to members.
There was some consideration given to commissioning Piper for a further two paintings, or one painting and a sculpture for the south side of the Great Hall, but this did not come to fruition.
The original of Conisbrough Castle was loaned to the Tate in 1983 for a John Piper exhibition and was replaced by a screen print for the duration of the loan with a suitable annotation displayed.
Further Piper works at CAH
As well as the commissioned works ICAEW has several screen prints of Piper's work on display. 'Artist's proofs' of Buckden in a storm, Conisbrough Castle, and St David's Abbey, Wales hang in a meeting room, along with two prints of flowers
There are a further four Piper prints not currently on display: Duchess Fountain, Blenheim Palace and Blenheim Palace plus a further two flower prints.
