David Remfry studied at Hull College of Art from 1959 to 1964. Remfry had his first solo show in London in 1973 and has since had more than 50 international solo exhibitions. Over the past five decades, Remfry has become known for his large-scale watercolours of dancers and his drawings and watercolours of neighbours and friends at the Hotel Chelsea in New York City, where he lived from 1995 to 2016.
Remfry’s first show in the United States was at the Ankrum Gallery, Los Angeles in 1980. He has exhibited regularly since then at galleries in New York, Los Angeles and Florida and in 2002 had a solo exhibition at MoMA PS1, which was curated by Alanna Heiss and Daniel Marzona. Solo museum shows in England include the Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge, Ferens Art Gallery, Hull, (1975 and 2005) Middlesbrough Art Gallery, the National Portrait Gallery and the Victoria and Albert Museum, London. He has exhibited many times at galleries in Holland and Germany.
Remfry was elected a member of the Royal Watercolour Society in 1987. In 2001 he was awarded an MBE for services to British Art in America, in 2006 he was elected a Member of the Royal Academy of Arts and in 2007 he was invited to receive Honorary Doctorate of Arts by the University of Lincoln. He was awarded the Hugh Casson Drawing Prize at the 2010 Royal Academy Summer Exhibition and was Professor of Drawing at the Royal Academy Schools from 2016 to 2018.
A retrospective of Remfry’s work, curated by Dr Gerardine Mulcahy-Parker, is planned for 2025 at Beverley Art Gallery, East Riding.
Born: 1942 in Worthing, Sussex, England, United Kingdom
Nationality: British
Elected RA: 2 June 2006
Elected Senior RA: 1 October 2017
Honorary officer: Eranda Professor of Drawing 2016 - 19 March 2018
Gender: Male
Contact information:
Preferred media: Painting and Printmaking
2023 The Usher Gallery, Lincoln
Rugby Art Gallery and Museum, Rugby
2022 Royal Watercolour Society, London
2020-21 The Lightbox, Woking
2016-17 The Museum of Art - DeLand, Florida
2015 Pallant House Gallery, Chichester
2005 Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge, England
Ferens Art Gallery, Hull, England
2004 Butler Institute of American Art, Youngstown, Ohio
2003 Victoria and Albert Museum, London
2002 Boca Raton Museum of Art, Florida
2001 MoMA PS1, New York City
1999 Boca Raton Museum of Art, Florida
1992 National Portrait Gallery
The Bass Museum of Art, Miami Beach, Florida
Boca Raton Museum of Art, Florida
The British Museum, London
Butler Institute of American Art, Youngstown, Ohio
Contemporary Art Society, London
Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge
Government Art Collection, UK
Leeds Art Gallery, UK
Middlesbrough Institute of Modern Art
Minnesota Museum of American Art, Saint Paul
National Portrait Gallery, London
New Orleans Museum of Art, Louisiana
Orlando Museum of Art, Florida
Pallant House Gallery, Chichester
The Patricia and Phillip Frost Art Museum, Florida International University, Miami
Museo Rayo, Roldanillo, Colombia
Royal Academy of Arts, London
Royal Collection, Windsor
Royal Watercolour Society, London
Rugby Art Gallery and Museum, Rugby
Swarthmore College, Pennsylvania
Towner Art Gallery, Eastbourne
Victoria and Albert Museum, London
Whitworth Art Gallery, Manchester
David Remfry Watercolour by Jill Leman (President RWS) and James Russell, published by Royal Academy of Arts, 2022
We Think the World of You, published by Royal Academy of Arts, 2015
David Remfry: Drawings for Stella McCartney, published to coincide with an exhibition at the Victoria and Albert Museum, 2003
David Remfry Dancers by Edward Lucie-Smith, Dore Ashton and Carter Ratcliff, published by Boca Raton Museum of Art, 2002