Jean Cooke

the Royal Colleges post graduate program.[1][2] Cookes

interest in painting grew under the tutelage of Ruskin
Spear, Rodrigo Moynihan, and Carel Weight.[1][2][3]

Jean Esme Oregon Cooke RA (1927-2008) was an English painter of still lifes, landscapes, portraits and gures. She was a lecturer at the Royal Academy and regularly exhibited her works, including the summer Royal
Academy exhibitions. She was commissioned to make
portraits by Lincoln College and St Hildas College, Oxford. Her works are in the National Gallery, Tate and
the Royal Academy collections. In the beginning of her
marriage, she signed her works Jean Bratby.

In 1964 she had her rst solo exhibition at Leicester

Galleries. She developed a following, including Bethel
Solomons and Brinsley Ford who collected her regularly
exhibited works. Bratby did not achieve the recognition
that his wife received and he was upset by it, which made
their relationship increasingly dicult. He often painted
over[1][2] or slashed her works and restricted her painting time to three morning hours.[3] Bratby had aairs
and was physically abusive and cruel.[1][2] He was said,
though, to have had an enlivening, inspiring eect on
her artistically.[3]

Early life

Jean Esme Oregon Cooke was born on 18 February 1927

in South London to Arthur Oregon Cooke and his wife.
Arthur owned a shop in Blackheath, London[nb 1] where
he sold hardware supplies and groceries. Until she was
about 6 1/2 years old, Cooke spent a lot of time in her
fathers shop, her mother didn't see the value in education and kept her out of school until then.[1][2] Her mother
had an artistic spirit, creating beautiful colours to decorate the walls by subtly mixing odd touches of paint.[3]
As a young girl she drew, painted and modeled gures
and heads in plasticine. She attended Blackheath High
School.[1][2]

3 Career
In 1964 she began teaching students to paint at the Royal
College. The following year the Royal Academy made
her an associate member and in 1972 she was made a full
member. She lectured at the college until 1974. During the summers she exhibited her works at the Royal
Academy exhibition. The seascape at her cottage[nb 2] and
the landscape surrounding her Edwardian mansion featured in her paintings: cherry trees in full bloom, long
grass lled with buttercups and blue-owering lungwort,
or the dark evergreens lit by the house windows at night.
Doves were favourite models and appeared frequently.
She made self-portraits,[nb 3] paintings of her husband;
and portraits. She was commissioned by St Hildas College, Oxford to paint its principal, Mary Bennett and
was hired by Lincoln College to make portraits of Walter
Oakeshott and Egon Wellesz. Her works reected sensitivity, beauty, and insight - made with a subtle, understated, individual sense of colour. Piet Mondrian was
one of her favourite artists.[1][2] Her work has been compared to Gwen John and Paula Modersohn-Becker.[3]

Early adulthood

Cooke began her art studies in 1943 at the Central School

of Arts and Crafts. She studied life drawing under
Bernard Meninsky, textile design, and illustration at the
Central School until 1945. Cooke then studied sculpture
at Goldsmiths College and pottery at Camberwell College
of Arts. Interested in becoming a teacher, she enrolled
in the teacher education course at Goldsmiths, which she
completed in 1950.[1][2]
Initially, Cooke was most interested in pursuing sculpture,
partly because oils were expensive and clay was free at the
college. One of her works won a prize, but after suering
a biking accident where she had dislocated her thumb,
she worked in pottery. In 1950 she established a pottery
workshop in Sussex.[1][2]

Cooke made several self-portraits, like Blast Bodicea, Jamais je ne pleure et jamais je ne ris (I never cry and I never
laugh),[4] and Self-Portrait (Tate).[5] Her self-portraits often reected humour to counterbalance the candid and
not particularly attering works.[1][2] In them she was
always searching for something, the previously unperceived. Cooke commented that she had dierent motivations, sometimes wanting to be alone, or to be acknowledge, or to show o. Blast Bodicea was made at the urging
of her husband, John Bratby, who had given her a heavy
brass remans helmet to be included in the work. Al-

John Bratby, a Royal College of Art painter, and Cooke

began a tempestuous dating relationship. Bratby, afraid
that she might leave him, locked her in his room once
during their courtship. In April 1953 they were married
and she took his last name. Later that year she entered
1

6 WORKS

though it became too dicult to paint while wearing the 5 Professional organisations
helmet, there are faint traces of the helmet visible in the
painting.[4]
Cooke became a Full Royal Academician in 1972, and for
Bratby and Cookes relationship experienced cycles of vi- many years her work has appeared annually in the Royal
olence throughout their marriage. Jean left their home in Academys Summer Exhibition. She was on the Council
fear, but would return based on the advice of their mentor of the Royal Academy in 1983 to 1985, 1992 to 94, and
and family friend, Carel Weight. She began signing her 2001 to 2002. In 1993 and 1994, she was a Senior hanger
[1]
works with her maiden name at Bratbys insistence.[nb 4] at the Royal Academy.
The couple had one daughter, Wendy, and three sons, From 1984 to 1986, Cooke was governor of the CenDayan, David, Jason. They were all artistic. The family tral School of Art and Design. She sat on the academic
shared their time between two houses. One was a sea- board of the Blackheath School of Art from 1986 to
side cottage at Birling Gap and the other was a large, cold 1988. She was a member of the Friends of Woodlands
Edwardian manor, which had tennis courts, a swimming Art Gallery.[1]
pool and a largely untended garden. The couples relationship was over in 1977.[1][2][3]
Starting in 1974 Cooke held open studios for the Green- 6 Works
wich Festival, something she continued until 1994. Her
works are at the National Gallery, Tate and the Royal A selection of her works include:
Academy.[1]
Birth of Icarus, 1998, Piano Nobile Fine Paintings[7]

Later years

Blast Boadicea, oil on canvas, 1960, Royal Academy

of Arts, London[4]
Dream Dream, 2008[8]

In 2003, her house caught re, many of her pictures

were lost, and the building was destroyed.[nb 5] She moved
into a Charlton Village at and continued her painting
there. She died on 6 August 2008 at her second cottage
at Birling Gap[1][2] while looking at the sea out of her
window. The cause of death was pneumonia.[3]
Andrew Lambirth wrote of her in the days following her
death:

Egon Joseph Wellesz (1885-1974), Lincoln College,

University of Oxford
Grassland, Government Art Collection[5]
Jamais je ne pleure et jamais je ne ris (I never cry
and I never laugh), oil on canvas, c. 1972, Royal
Academy of Arts, London[4]
John Bratby (1928-1992), Royal Academy of Arts[5]

Jean Cooke was a painter of wit and

subtlety, a lovely and unusual colourist who
painted landscape and still-life with great but
understated feeling. She was also a gure
painter, and a dab hand at portraits, but her
nest achievement was in the depiction of the
natural world: clis and the sea, a mountain
meadow, the eects of mist or moonlight, a
collection of fruit or owers. In recent years,
Cookes still-lifes could appear somewhat minimal and haphazard, but they were always perfectly phrased and pitched. Solitary blooms
against bare canvas with a scribble of background colour, they have the compression and
self-suciency of a poem.

Friend and playwright Nell Dunn wrote that she had a

crazy sense of humour - she sees herself as a comic character in a comic world, with the only serious thing being
painting.[3]

John Bratby (1928-1992), Royal College of Art[5]

Lily, Lily on the Brow, Calderdale Metropolitan Borough Council[5]
Mad Self Portrait, Tullie House Museum and Art
Gallery[5]
Mary Bennett, Principal (1965-1980) St Hildas College, University of Oxford
Not Waving, Just Painting, Usher Gallery, The Collection: Art & Archaeology in Lincolnshire
Portrait of a Boy, Kirklees Museums and Galleries[5]
Self-Portrait, Tate, 1958[5][9]
Sir Walter Oakeshott (1903-1987), Lincoln College,
University of Oxford
The greenhouse, oil on board, 1955[7]
The Italian Straw Hat, London Borough of
Camden[5]

3
The yellow cli, oil on canvas, 1974[7]
Through the Looking Glass, 1960, Royal Academy
of Arts[4][5]
Union Wharf, Government Art Collection[5]
Young girl with parasol, oil on board[7]

Exhibitions

Some of her exhibitions were:[1]

1956 - The rst year her work was included in group
exhibitions
1963 - Her rst solo exhibition was held at the Establishment Club in London
1964 - Solo exhibition at the Leicester Galleries
1965 - Bear Lane Gallery in Oxford
1965 - Moyan Gallery, Manchester
1971 - New Grafton Gallery, London
1974 - Group exhibitions at Agnews
1976 - Dulwich Picture Gallery
1976 - British Painting 1952 to 1977 at the Royal
Academy
1979 - Tate Gallery
1980 - Norwich Gallery
1990 - Sir Hugh Casson Room for Friends at the
Royal Academy of Arts
1996 - Along with Maggi Hambling, she contributed
to In The Looking Glass, an exhibition at the
Usher Gallery, Lincoln, that brought together a
group of contemporary self-portraits by women.

Notes

[1] The Telegraph says that her fathers grocery shop was in
Lewisham.[1]
[2] The cottage was rented from the National Trust. It had set
precariously near the edge of a cli and was demolished
for safety. Cooke then rented the next cottage in line, destined to survive only another 10 years.[3]
[3] Ruth Borchard, who collected paintings of British artists,
oered Cooke 21 gunieaus for her self-portrait. Although
it was half her usual commission, she made the painting, she said, to help increase the percentage of women
painters in her collection. At the time, of her collection
of 91 paintings, Borchard only had 3 women.[3]

[4] John Bratby, distinguished a painter as he was,... the reversion was entirely at his insistence. He feared and resented the competition she oered to his reputation as the
one and only painting Bratby.[6]
[5] Although she lost most of her possessions and many paintings, she was mollied by the survival of her oils and paint
brushes.[3]

9 References
[1] Jean Cooke. The Telegraph (Telegraph Media Group
Limited). 22 August 2008. Retrieved 5 January 2014.
[2] Jean Cooke: Painter of wit and subtlety. The Independent (independent.co.uk). 11 August 2008. Retrieved 5
January 2014.
[3] Philip Vann (28 August 2008). Jean Cooke, obituary.
The Guardian. Retrieved 6 January 2014.
[4] Artist of the Month - October 2007: Jean Cooke RA
(1927-2008)". Royal Academy of Arts Collections. Royal
Academy of Arts. Retrieved 6 January 2014.
[5] Your Paintings: Jean Cooke paintings slideshow. BBC.
Retrieved 6 January 2014.
[6] Jean Cooke: a painter. The Times. 14 August 2008.
Retrieved 6 January 2014.
[7] Jean Cooke. ArtNet. Retrieved 6 January 2014.
[8] Humphrey Ocean RA remembers the painter Jean Cooke
RA, 1927-2008. Royal Academy. Spring 2009. Retrieved 6 January 2014.
[9] Jean Cooke (Jean Bratby) 19272008. Tate. Retrieved
6 January 2014.

10 Further reading
Contemporary British Artists, The Artist. 1980.
Mary Chamot, Dennis Farr and Martin Butlin
(1964). The Modern British Paintings, Drawings and
Sculpture. London.
Seeing Ourselves: womens self-portraits. 1998.
The Artists Garden. 1989.

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