George Large was born in Islington, London in 1936 and went on to study art at Hornsey College of Art from 1958-63 where one of his fellow students was Allen Jones. The work of Edward Burra and Stanley Spencer has been influential upon Large’s art. Human figures are important components in Large’s compositions, often men at work, used as the artist says, because I distort the shapes and love great big muscles. It’s the solidness, it works better for distortion. As the art critic Anthony J.Lester has written, These monumental, sculpture-like, wilfully convoluted figures now consume his paintings. They have become the very hallmark of all his work.
