Mary Fitzpayne

Early life and education

Born Alice Mary Fitzpayne in Catterick, North Yorkshire, and brought up in Leeds. Educated at Leeds College of Art, Central School of Art and Design and the Royal College of Art, studying under the artists Roderigo Moynihan, Carel Weight, John Minton, Francis Bacon and Ruskin Spear. It was while a student there she met the painter Eric Doitch, who was to become her husband. They set up home in London, eventually moving to their house in Camberwell where they pursued their careers as artists. Their house became renowned for the extraordinary collection of art that was hung on the walls, and their circle of friends which included writers such as Elias Canetti, Richard Grunberger and Erich Fried.

Painting and drawing

Fitzpayne found her subjects among the lives of the street drinkers that populated Camberwell at the time. The artist's lifelong identification with, and concern for those on the margins of society, led her to begin a series of drawings and paintings in the early 1960s depicting those made homeless by the closure of the homeless hostels. These people went on to live in makeshift communes in central London venues. As a person she had sympathy with their plight and was always at great pains to point out that they were human beings who deserved to be treated with fairness and dignity. Fitzpayne made regular visits to the areas where they slept and to the church of St Martin-in-the-Fields which has always offered shelter.

Fitzpayne's paintings of the circus, inspired by a visit made with her children, began an artistic journey that continues to this day. Clowns, harlequins and circus acrobats people the internal landscape of her work. She moved to rural Lincolnshire in 1971. Her work continues to be drawn from mythological and religious subjects in a vivid figurative manner.

Personal life

Mary Fitzpayne married the Austrian refugee artist Eric Doitch in 1954. They had two children, Käthe Deutsch, the artist, and a son, George.