Alan Davie

Alan Davie (Grangemouth, Scotland, 1920 – 2014) was a leading figure in postwar British art and a key force in introducing gestural abstraction and Action Painting to the United Kingdom.

He studied at the Edinburgh College of Art and began developing a radical painterly language in the late 1940s, deeply influenced by Eastern philosophy, jazz, and Jungian psychoanalysis. His encounter with American Abstract Expressionism, particularly the work of Jackson Pollock, proved decisive, while his practice retained a strong sense of independence and individuality.

Davie’s paintings are characterized by dense surfaces, calligraphic marks, archaic symbols, and vivid fields of color, in which gesture, improvisation, and spirituality merge into a deeply ritualistic form of expression. Alongside painting, he worked in sculpture, ceramics, music, and poetry, embracing art as a total and interdisciplinary experience.

His work has been exhibited at major international institutions including Tate Gallery in London, the Museum of Modern Art in New York, and the Venice Biennale. Today, Alan Davie is recognized as a central figure in the history of European abstraction and as a cultural bridge between American avant-garde movements and the British art scene.