MADDOX, CONROY (British, 1912-2005)

Painter, essayist and collagist, Conroy Maddox made contact with the Parisian surrealists in 1937-38. Despite his protest against the inclusion of non-surrealist exhibitors in the International Surrealist Exhibition at the Burlington Galleries in 1936, Maddox did join the English group in 1939. Since then, he took part in all of its activities and collaborated in its various publications, London Bulletin, Arson, Message from Nowhere and Free Unions Libres 1946, for which he designed the cover. Maddox’ pictorial creativity had unfolded mainly along two complementary, but very different axes. On the one hand, he has pursued investigations in automatism, in particular by way of ‘écrémage’, a process he invented combining the techniques of ‘décalcomania’ and scratching, producing semi-abstract landscapes in which weird wiry creatures pop up, reminiscent of Yves Tanguy’s work at the time. On the other hand, Maddox has tirelessly surveyed the eccentric quarters of an imaginary city where each street, each house and each park is the site for strange encounters and baroque conflicts. In this respect, one may say that Maddox’s paintings have added more than one enchanting page to the book of the ‘great surrealist promenades’, which go from Breton’s Nadja and L’amour fou to Aragon’s Paysage de Paris. Maddox possesses in the highest degree the art of arousing the genius of the place; it is probably he who, with the metaphysical stride of de Chirico and Magritte, has evoked the mystery of passages and arcades with the most lucidly critical spirit, without ever losing the sense of the marvellous.

Maddox organised the landmark exhibition Surrealism Unlimited 1960-1978, at the Camden Art Centre in London and participated in numerous other surrealist exhibitions in England and abroad, notably in London, Zwemmer Gallery, 1940, Paris, 1947, Exeter, 1967, London, 1971, Chicago, 1976 and Lyon, 1981.

Public collections include:
British Museum, London
Gallerie Nazionale d’Arte Moderna, Rome
Israel Museum, Jerusalem
Leeds City Art Gallery, Leeds
Solomon R Guggenheim Museum, New York
Tate, London
Ulster Museum, Belfast
Victoria & Albert Museum, London

Bibliography
S. LEVY, Conroy Maddox: Surreal Enigmas, Keele University Press, 1995; - S.LEVY, The Scandalous Eye. The Surrealism of Conroy Maddox., Liverpool University Press, 2003.

Solo Exhibitons
2002, Hidden Thoughts: Surrealist Collages of Conroy Maddox, Whitford Fine Art, London.

2001, Conroy Maddox. A Surrealist Odyssey, Belgrave Gallery, London; Conroy Maddox traverse la manche avec 10 tableaux, Galerie les Yeux Fertiles, Paris

2000, Surrealism in Birmingham 1935-1955, Birmingham Museums.

1999, Conroy Maddox: An English Surrealist, Mercer Gallery, Harrogate.

1997, Conroy Maddox, Town Council Offices, Ledbury.

1996, Conroy Maddox: Perpetual Surrealist, Clayton Gallery, Newcastle-upon-Tyne; Conroy
Maddox Taking Surrealist Liberties, Trinity Theatre and Arts Centre, Tunbridge Wells.

1995, Conroy Maddox: Surreal Enigmas, Stoke City Museum and Art Gallery, touring exhibition.

1994, Conroy Maddox: Paintings and Objects, Gallery M, London.

1990, Surrealist Paintings, Collages and Objects by Conroy Maddox, Bonham and Feely Gallery, London.

1987, Galerie Rutzmoser, Munich; Conroy Maddox, Gouaches, Galerie d’Endt, Amsterdam; Conroy Maddox, Gouachemĺlningar Frĺn 1940 - Talet, Galerie Bel’Art, Stockholm.

1986, Conroy Maddox, Paintings and Gouaches 1935 - 85, Blond Fine Art, London.

1984, Gouaches of the 1940s, Blond Fine Art, London

1984, Conroy Maddox Ölbilder und Gouachen, Galerie Rutzmoser, Munich.

1982, Peinture Surrealiste en Angleterre 1930-1960, Galerie 1900-2000, Paris.

1981, Dunn=s Galleries, Dana Point, California ; Paintings by the Surrealist Conroy Maddox, Rye Art Gallery, Sussex.

1980, The Surrealist Eye, Conroy Maddox, Holsworthy Gallery, London.

1978, Surrealism Unlimited, Camden Arts Centre <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Camden_Arts_Centre>, London; Conroy Maddox Ölbilder und Collagen, Galerie Rutzmoser, Munich.

1977, Conroy Maddox, Paintings - Collages - Gouaches 1940 - 1976, Galerie Farber, Brussels; Oils, Collages and Gouaches of the 1940’s - 1070’s by Conroy Maddox, Margaret Fisher, London.

1976, Gouaches of the 1940s, Fischer Fine Art, London; Conroy Maddox, Mĺlningar Och Collages 1938 - 1954, Galerie Bel’Art, Stockholm.

1975, Exe Gallery, Exeter.

1974, Conroy Maddox, British Surrealist, Bede Gallery, Jarrow

1973, Hamet Gallery, London.

1972, Conroy Maddox, Hamet Gallery, London.

1967, Conroy Maddox, Collages - Gouaches, Zwemmer Gallery, London; Conroy Maddox, Recent Paintings, John Whibley Gallery, London.

1963, Conroy Maddox, Paintings and Collage- pantings, Grabowski Gallery, London.

1959, Paintings by Conroy Maddox, New Vision Centre Gallery, London.

1946, Warwick Galleries, Birmingham.