Anita Klein studied at Chelsea and the Slade Schools of Art in London. From 2003 - 2006 she was president of the Royal Society of Painter Printmakers (PRE) and she has work in many private and public collections in Europe, the USA and Australia, including the Arts Council of Great Britain, the British Museum and the British Library. She has had many solo exhibitions in the London as well as worldwide,
Anita Klein studied at Chelsea and the Slade Schools of Art in London. From 2003 - 2006 she was president of the Royal Society of Painter Printmakers (PRE) and she has work in many private and public collections in Europe, the USA and Australia, including the Arts Council of Great Britain, the British Museum and the British Library. She has had many solo exhibitions in the London as well as worldwide, and three monographs of her paintings have been published by Five Leaves Pubs. Anita Klein now divides her time between studios in London and in Italy. "It is nice to have a real humorist recruited to the ranks of gifted painters. She is to be congratulated on livening up our dreary lives." - Art Review “Ravel said he wanted his music to be complex, but not complicated. Anita Klein might say the same of her art. There is a grand simplicity to her works, but that is not the same as saying that they lack subtlety and ambiguity. On the contrary, they have the sort of unselfconscious directness that comes from living and breathing art for so long that it becomes second nature” John Russell Taylor Collections The British Museum prints and drawings collection The British Library London The Arts Council of Great Britain University of Aberystwyth Ashmolean Museum Oxford Fitzwilliam Museum Cambridge Leicester Education Department
Qualifications and training 1985 - MA, Fine Art Printmaking, Slade School of Fine Art, London 1983 - BA Hons, Fine Art, Slade School of Fine Art, London 1979 - Foundation Course, Chelsea School of Art, London
Selected solo exhibitions
2015 Eames Fine Art London – Full Circle; New paintings
Marine House at Beer, Devon – new paintings
Wetpaint Gallery Cirencester – paintings and prints
Oriel Wrecsam, Wales – Printmaker in Focus
2014 Eames Fine Art London – paintings & prints
Hayletts Contemporary Art Essex – paintings & prints
Cambridge Contemporary Art – paintings & prints
2013 Konst och Folk, Stockholm – paintings & prints
Eames Fine Art London – paintings
Galleri Bla, Linkoping, Sweden – paintings & prints
Art Vault, Mildura, Australia – linocuts
Birds Gallery, Melbourne, Australia - linocuts
2012 The Fine Art Partnership London – Linocuts
Marine House at Beer, Devon – paintings and prints
Oriel Wrecsam Gallery, Wales – prints
The Story Museum Oxford – mural and paintings
The Royal College of Music London – backdrop, paintings and prints
2011 - Through the Looking Glass, Bankside Gallery & Menier Gallery, London SE1 2010 - Un Altro Mondo, Advanced Graphics London, London SE1 2009 - Anita Klein Paintings and Drawings, Boundary Gallery, London 2009 - Italian Angels, Bankside Gallery, London 2008 - Anita Klein Monoprints, Advanced Graphics , London 2007 - Anita Klein New Prints, Chelsea & Westminster Hospital Gallery, London 2007 - Australian Paintings, The Royal Commonwealth Club, London 2006 - Anita Klein Monoprints, Advanced Graphics, London 2006 - Anita Klein Paintings and Prints, Bankside Gallery, London 2006 - Anita Klein, Small oils, watercolours & sculpture, Boundary Gallery, London 2006 - Prints and Monotypes, Advanced Graphics, London 2005 - Anita Klein: New Prints, Greek Printmakers Gallery, Athens, Greece 2004 - Bircham Gallery, Norfolk 2004 - Brook Gallery, Devon 2004 - New Ashgate Gallery, Farnham 2004 - Pyramid Gallery, York 2004 - New Paintings, Boundary Gallery, London 2004 - Ordinary Miracles, Advanced Graphics, London 2003 - Helen Gory Gallery, Melbourne, Australia 2003 - Anita Klein Paintings, Helen Gory Gallery, Melbourne Australia 2002 - Advanced Graphics, London 2002 - Anita Klein 20 Years of Printmaking, Advanced Graphics, Castle Gallery, London, Inverness 2002 - Anita Klein New Paintings, Boundary Gallery, London 2002 - Boundary Gallery, London 2001 - Boundary Gallery, London 2000 - Cambridge Contemporary Art 2000 - Port Jackson Press, Melbourne, Australia 1999 - Port Jackson Press, Melbourne, Australia 1999 - Pyramid Gallery, York 1998 - Beaux Arts, Bath 1998 - Cambridge Contemporary Art 1998 - New Ashgate Gallery, Farnham 1997 - Leeds City Art Gallery, The Craft and Design Centre
Selected Group exhibitions
2011 - IFPDA international print fair, The Armoury, New York 2005 - Art 2005, Business Design Centre, London 2003 - Art 2003, Business Design Centre Islington, London 2003 - National Print Exhibition, Mall Galleries, London 2003 - New Publications, Advanced Graphics, London 2002 - Art 2002, Business Design Centre Islington, London 2002 - National Print Exhibition, Mall Galleries, London 2002 - New Publications, Advanced Graphics, London 2001 - Art 2001, Business Design Centre Islington, London 2001 - Art 2001, Business Design Centre, London 2001 - National Print Exhibition, Mall Galleries, London 2001 - National Print Exhibition, London 2001 - New Publications, Advanced Graphics, London 2001 - New Publications, Advanced Graphics, London 2000 - 20/21 British Art, Royal College of Art, London 2000 - Art on Paper Fair, Royal College of Art, London 2000 - Contemporary Print Show, Barbican Centre, London 2000 - Hunting Art Prizes, London 2000 - New Publications, Advanced Graphics, London 1999 - New Publications, Advanced Graphics, London 1998 - New Publications, Advanced Graphics, London 1997 - New Publications, Advanced Graphics London, London
Public collections:
British Museum, Arts Council England, V&A Museum, London, British Library, University of Wales Aberystwyth, University College London, Ashmolean Museum Oxford, Fitzwilliam Museum Cambridge, Paintings in Hospitals permanent collection, Leicestershire Education Authority, Freshfields London, Arthur Boyd Collection Australia, Borchard Collection of 20th Century Self Portraits
Press:
“Ravel said he wanted his music to be complex, but not complicated. Anita Klein might say the same of her art. There is a grand simplicity to her works, but that is not the same as saying that they lack subtlety and ambiguity. On the contrary, they have the sort of unselfconscious directness that comes from living and breathing art for so long that it becomes second nature” John Russell Taylor, The Times, London.
-“A strong, quirkily humorous depiction of quotidian events” - Nick Andrew, Galleries magazine
-“The pictures, which celebrate the small moments of life which often go unappreciated, are warm, witty and quite delightful” - Julia Weiner, Jewish Chronicle
-“It is quite brave not only to have a subject matter to your painting these days but also to be fascinated by such ordinary things. There are no desperate attempts to shock, expose or outrage; simply poignant moments showing the things which you would most miss if they were taken away from you” - Helen Smithson, Ham & High.
-“Celebrating oases of joy in the quotidian, Anita Klein builds a personal archive, brimming with charisma and wit, that can be identified with by everyone” - Britart.com
-“It is nice to have a real humorist recruited to the ranks of gifted painters. She is to be congratulated on livening up our dreary lives” - Guy Burn, Art Review.
-“Star of the show for me is the spare, knowing, subversive and comic work of a young painter called Anita Klein” - Godfrey Smith, Sunday Times
-“A blithe demonstration of intimacy” - William Zimmer, New York Times
-"She is an artist of extraordinary verve and lyrical touch...These images are mirrors of a resonant delight in the moment, an exuberant and infectious love of life. Unfashionable as it is, Anita Klein’s work actually makes us happy." David Carpanini PRE
-“ Anita Klein renders the ordinary existence into a celebration of life - mostly based on her family. Her style is remarkably and unmistakably individual - her brilliant palette (based on her Australian childhood?), great compositions and draughtsmanship (hardly to be attributed to the Slade - when she studied there, figurative art was out of favour) all reveal a highly committed and uncompromising artist.” Agi Katz, Boundary Gallery London
-‘I know she’s got a quirky scale and that the figures are larger than life,’ says Jenny Groom, owner of a cookery school in Wiltshire, who bought one of Anita Klein’s oil paintings five years ago, ‘but it just accentuates their personality. The painting I have is called "Tuesday Evening", and it shows two women sitting across the table from one another, each holding a glass of wine. You just know they’ve got rid of their husbands and the kids are in bed and they’re having a good gossip, and it makes me laugh every time I look at it. She observes the minutiae of family life - the little things we do that are important to us. If my house was burning down, this is what I’d save.’(Quoted in the Telegraph Magazine 2004)
-“Those values of disegno - line and division, pure colour planes, formal pattern and interval - are those of the great mural painting of the early renaissance - the art of Giotto, Piero della Francesco and Masaccio - that Klein reveres above all others, and to which she has paid the closest attention. Like theirs, hers is an art of stillness, of action caught and suspended in the transfiguring moment.... These are the elements of abstract style, the components of the formal economy to which I referred at the outset. They are to be found ...in the quattrocento modernism that placed such revolutionary value upon the depiction of ordinary men and women in extraordinary circumstances, conferring dignity upon them by abstract formalities of figuration and placement. Klein puts these grand principles of ‘artistic style’ to work in the transformation of the South London quotidian, creating out of household events and holiday pleasures images of a resonant contemporary myth of love.”
Mel Gooding April 2006
“This award reflects the emotional insight of Anita Klein in her observation and understanding of intimate social, family and sexual relationships, and her glorious ability to bring them to paper. It celebrates her sensual feel for form, human curves, shapes, moods, the patterns of touch between friends and friends – and lovers; the flow of their clothes and naked bodies; and the graceful optimism her paintings release into the world. They warm the air.” Best Artist award UK Fringe, Fringe Report 2007
“Anita Klein is one of the finest and most collected printmakers working in Britain today. Her art is witty, charismatic, warm and poignant; an archive of personal moments that everyone can identify with.” Latest 7 Magazine 2008
“At a time when the art world seems to be full of artists attempting to shock and denigrate, Klein’s intimate, life affirming work comes as a welcome breath of fresh air. Her works convey a unique pleasure in the everyday moments that make life special”. Vincent Eames, The Fine Art Partnership
“How refreshing, then, to encounter the art of Anita Klein. This London based artist understands implicitly that, while art is a product to be made and traded, it is primarily and most importantly a way of communication between the artist and the public, a medium for sharing what it means to be alive and aware. Her work is popular, but never dumbed down, and it is very well made. Her paintings and prints can be understood at first viewing but, like all good art,become better known and more satisfying through repeated viewings... What unites all these works is their honesty, resulting in images that find their place in peoples’ homes and lives, rewarding repeated viewings, and producing delight. That is a rare gift in the art world.”
Richard Noyce, The India Art Journal. Spring 2012
