Nationality New Zealander Period Modernism | Known for Painter | |
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Full Name Robert Wallace Ellis Spouse(s) Elizabeth Aroha Mountain (m. 1966) Artwork Urban city, Rakaumangamanga 21 Oketopa 1984 | ||
Robert Wallace Ellis ONZM (born 2 April 1929) is a British-born New Zealand painter and artist known for paintings that tackle social, cultural and environmental themes.
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Early life and family
Born in Northampton, England, on 2 April 1929, Ellis studied at Northampton School of Art from 1944 to 1947, before completing his national service with the photographic unit of RAF Bomber Command between 1947 and 1949. He then studied at Hammersmith School of Art from 1940 to 1950, and the Royal College of Art from 1949 to 1953. Ellis emigrated to New Zealand in 1957, and married Elizabeth Aroha Mountain in 1966. The couple went on to have two children. Ellis became a naturalised New Zealander in 1971.
Academic and artistic career
Ellis lectured at the Yeovil School of Art in Somerset from 1953 to 1957. After he moved to Auckland in 1957 he began teaching at Elam School of Fine Arts and continued until 1994, retiring as a professor emeritus. During 1982 he was a visiting professor at Ohio State University.
Ellis served as a council member of the Auckland Society of Arts, and was the foundation president of the New Zealand Society of Industrial Designers. He was also a council member, secretary, and president of the New Zealand Society of Sculptors, Painters and Associates, and was a New Zealand delegate to the International Art Medal Federation. In the 2001 New Year Honours Ellis was appointed an Officer of the New Zealand Order of Merit for services to fine arts.
Ellis has been described as one of "New Zealand's pre-eminent artists" and he has held more than 60 solo exhibitions in New Zealand and around the world.
His landscape paintings address themes of urbanisation, subdivision and colonisation. An Auckland Art Gallery senior curator describes Ellis' place in modern New Zealand art; "As a major figure, Ellis' art addresses many cultural issues. His subjects range over tensions between transport and urbanism, contrast ecology with spirituality and look at the on-going nature of Māori–Pākehā relations."