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John Randall Bratby; David Bratby; Jean Esme Oregon Cooke

13 of 25 portraits of John Randall Bratby

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© National Portrait Gallery, London

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John Randall Bratby; David Bratby; Jean Esme Oregon Cooke

by Ida Kar
vintage bromide print, 1959
8 in. x 9 1/4 in. (202 mm x 234 mm)
Purchased, 1999
Photographs Collection
NPG x88625

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  • Ida Kar (1908-1974), Photographer. Artist or producer associated with 1567 portraits, Sitter in 137 portraits.

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  • Freestone, Clare (appreciation) Wright, Karen (appreciation), Ida Kar Bohemian Photographer, 2011 (accompanying the exhibition at the National Portrait Gallery from 10 March to 19 June 2011), p. 101 Read entry

    Bratby was a prolific painter with a vigorous style who became associated with the avant-garde movement known as the new realism and with the kitchen-sink artists, who celebrated the everyday life of ordinary people. In 1954 his public career was launched with a solo exhibition at the Beaux Arts Gallery (his paintings can be seen in Kar's photograph of Helen Lessore, who named him 'the poet of the commonplace'). Bratby represented Britain at the 1956 Venice Biennale, and in 1957 was commissioned to paint the pictures for the film The Horse's Mouth, starring Alec Guinness. Bratby also wrote several novels, including the autobiographical Breakdown (1960). He became a Royal Academician in 1971. Bratby married fellow painter Jean Cooke in 1953, and Kar photographed the couple with their son, David, at their house in Hardy Road, Blackheath. The couple painted each other on numerous occasions, and David also appeared in many of Bratby's domestic scenes. Kar's variant portrait of Bratby alone was used to publicise a Beaux Arts Gallery solo exhibition in the Tatler & Bystander. The accompanying caption stated that Bratby's hobby was 'collecting junk shop oddities'. An assured figurative painter, Cooke had her first solo show at the Leicester Galleries in 1964 and exhibited her work regularly from then on.

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Current affairs

Harold Macmillan wins the general election with an increased majority, returning to office as Conservative prime minister. The victory was the result of perceived economic improvement under the Conservative government, and his (misquoted) boast: 'you've never had it so good.' During his premiership he earned the nickname 'Supermac', coined by cartoonist, Victor 'Vicky' Weisz.

Art and science

Claudia Jones organises the first West Indian-style carnival in the country, starting the tradition of the annual Notting Hill carnival. The event was a response to the race riots of 1958, and an attempt to celebrate West Indian culture and help overcome racial prejudice by giving the whole community the opportunity to join in the event.

International

Fidel Castro becomes leader of Cuba. After defeating the American-backed Batista government, Castro's revolutionary army arrived in Havana on 8th January where Castro proclaimed himself Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces. Within a month, Prime Minister José Miró Cardona had resigned, and Castro took over.
In Tibet, an uprising against Chinese rule is brutally crushed, and the Dalai Lama flees to India, beginning his long exile.

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