Belfast artist Colin Middleton studied at the Belfast College of Art where he won the RDS Taylor Scholarship in 1932, and went on to take night classes at the Belfast Royal Academy while working for the family’s damask business. He began exhibiting at the RHA in 1938, and was elected a full member in 1970. In 1943 the Belfast Museum and Art Gallery held a solo show of Middleton’s work, the largest they had mounted to date.
Middleton was represented by Victor Waddington from the early 1940s
, during which time his work was included in ‘New Irish Painters’, a group show that toured North America. He later showed with the Hendriks Gallery.
He settled in Bangor around this time and began teaching at the Belfast College of Art, while showing his own paintings in Dublin and Belfast. A poet and musician, Middleton also produced posters, murals and mosaics. A major retrospective of Middleton’s work was held in 1976 at the Ulster Museum and Hugh Lane Gallery Dublin. He was awarded an MBE in 1969 and an honorary doctorate by Queen’s University in 1972.
Colin Middleton's work was included in Adam's loan exhibitions:
'Ulster Artists' (2010). Please click here to view the catalogue.
'A Celebration of Irish Art and Modernism' (2011). Please click here to view the catalogue.
'Ireland: Her People and Landscape' (2012). Please click here to view the catalogue.
'Gerard Dillon: Art and Friendships' (2013). Please click here to view the catalogue.
'George Campbell and the Belfast Boys' exhibition (2015). Please click here to view the catalogue.
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