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George Fullard, sculptor, 1923-1973
Fullard came from a politically active mining family in Sheffield: his father, a Communist who was blacklisted after organising a deputies' strike at the Nunnery Colliery, wrote plays for Sheffield Left Theatre Club. Fullard, himself, was active in the Young Communist League in the late 1930s and early 40s whilst he was at the Sheffield College of Art. After serving two years in a tank regiment and receiving near fatal injuries at Monte Cassino in 1944 he took up his place at the Royal College of Art in Ambleside. It seems that he never resumed membership of the Communist Party after the war, though, like many other writers and artists, he remained a committed socialist.
He felt that he could contribute more through his own artistic work — work which was underpinned by a political view but never in any overt or propagandistic way. He was very much involved with John Berger's circle throughout the 1950s. In the New Statesman and Nation and elsewhere, Berger championed his work, alongside the 'Kitchen Sink' artists and other 'famously unacceptable' realists (Berger's term). Around 1956-57, Fullard was part of the Geneva Club, an informal discussion group set up by Berger and others which met regularly in central London and was attended by various writers, artists and scientists including Randall Swingler, Professor Bernal, John Willett, Doris Lessing and Paul Hogarth.
Fullard's work was also part of 'Looking at People' in 1957 — the first exhibition of contemporary British art to travel to the Soviet Union since 1917. Investigations at the National Musuem of Labour History have provided evidence that Fullard had some connections with the Communist Party Artists Group's Realism, the short-lived journal which ran to six issues between 1955 and 1956. In the 1960s, Fullard went on to become a well-established young sculptor, working in the 'assemblage' tradition and exploring the theme of 'war' in a profoundly personal and distinctive way. He was Head of Sculpture at the Chelsea School of Art when he died in 1973.
Importantly, Fullard's work, in the 1950s, was in sympathy with that of other artists and sculptors working in a humanist, figurative and 'realist' tradition — for example, Peter Peri, Ghisha Koenig and Betty Rea — and I am pursuing these connections as part of my work on Fullard. Having completed an MA in Sculpture Studies at the University of Leeds in 1995, with a substantial study of Fullard's work, I am now researching for a PhD. I have already contacted a number of Fullard's former friends, colleagues and students but I would welcome information from anyone who may be able to help with contacts, advice or support.
Please contact: Gillian Whiteley, 115 School Road, Beighton, Sheffield, S19 6EG tel: (0114) 247 2325; or: via the Department of Fine Art, University of Leeds, Leeds, LS2 9JT.
