Untitled

1923-1999

Michael Canney was born in Falmouth and  was taken to art shows from an early age.He studied at Redruth and Penzance schools of Art from 1940 to 1942 followed by Leonard Fuller’s St.Ives School of Painting. In 1947, after serving in the army he joined Goldsmiths' College School of Art, where he was a contemporary of Bridget Riley and he became more focused on abstraction. He also worked with  Victor Pasmore.

In 1956 he was appointed curator of Newlyn Orion Gallery, and began broadcasting on radio and television. At this time he also increasingly became a part of the West Country art community where he met Ben Nicholson and Barbara Hepworth, collaborating with Hepworth on a sculpture exhibition in 1957. He was close friends with Peter Lanyon and Patrick Heron as well as mixing in  art circles which included Robert Adams and William Scott.

During the late 1950’s abstract expressionism and artists including Mark Rothko increasingly influenced his work. From 1970 onwards, he began to paint in the constructivist tradition, using asymmetrical constructions and abstract forms. From the early 80s onwards Canney began to experiment with the medium alkyd oil, the properties of which allowed him to paint with a precision not possible with slow drying oils.

By the 1980s he began applying the numerical traditions of Constructivism to his paintings, deconstructing shapes, specifically the square, using numerical sequences and fractional division. His white reliefs of the late 70s and early 80s were stark and minimalist, ‘to master the simple in order to proceed to the complex’ he said.

In 1984 he moved to a village near Siena, Italy and continued to paint. In 1985 he scripted an award-winning documentary film for television on painting in Newlyn. He exhibited regularly at group exhibitions in Britain and abroad. His later one-man shows included Newlyn Art Gallery, 1983; Prescote Art and Design, Edinburgh, 1984; and the Belgrave Gallery from 1990. Plymouth City Art Gallery and several other public collections hold his work.