Samuel Robin Spark · Lablypedia

Prolific in his work, he created more than 1,000 paintings, photographs, and short texts and articles about art, Jewish culture, and his family.

Early life

Spark was born in Southern Rhodesia, then a British colony, to Sidney and Muriel Spark. His parents had met in Edinburgh at a dance, and his father later travelled to Southern Rhodesia, where he worked as a teacher. Muriel had joined Sidney in 1937, and Robin was born the following July in Bulawayo. The marriage soon deteriorated as Sidney, who was 13 years Muriel's senior, suffered from manic depression and had violent tendencies. Sidney refused to divorce Muriel, so Muriel left him, taking Robin with her. They moved first to Cape Town, living in a flat below Princess Frederica of Greece and the young Constantine.

Toward the end of the Second World War, Muriel managed to travel back to the United Kingdom by means of a troop ship, but was unable to secure passage for the four-year-old Robin, who was left in a convent school. In September 1945, Muriel brought Robin to Edinburgh. She then went to London to seek work, leaving Robin to be raised by Muriel's parents, the Cambergs, in their flat in Morningside/Bruntsfield.

Muriel Spark converted to Catholicism in 1954, but Robin chose to remain loyal to Judaism, much to his grandparents' satisfaction. Muriel did not attend his Bar Mitzvah in 1952, but sent 50 pounds for the party afterwards.

7 more chapters are free with a Lably account.

Education and careers

Robin was educated at the private Daniel Stewart's College in Edinburgh. He left at age 16 to pursue a career in the retail jewellery trade. He served his National Service in the Royal Army Medical Corps from 1957 to 1959, after which he studied at night school in order to obtain his Highers. In the late 1960s, he entered the Civil Service, in which he worked for 20 years in a variety of departments, ending as chief clerk to the Scottish Law Commission.

Despite never having studied art, Spark always had an interest in the subject, and he became convinced that he had to pursue a career in it. Udi Merioz, an international artist who was a friend of Robin, encouraged him to try to get into a college, so he started to attend evening classes at the art college and prepared a portfolio for entrance as a full-time student. He was offered a place at the Edinburgh College of Art and started the four-year course in 1983, graduating with a BA (Hons). He then was awarded an Andrew Grant Scholarship and became an art tutor while continuing his painting.

In 1989, Spark was awarded an Israel Zangwill scholarship.

Abstract and figurative work

Spark expressed emotion through his predominantly figurative work. He intuitively took liberties with perspective and proportions where doing so helped the composition.

There is a strong Jewish feeling in some of his pictures because of his education and family background, and he always signed his paintings in Hebrew. His work also shows the influence of the Scottish Colourists and an interest in the underlying bone and muscle structure of the human body. In his later years, his work moved into pure abstract symbolism. Spark used pastels on paper and impasto.

Solo exhibitions

Stenberg Centre for Judaism, London & University Staff Club, Edinburgh
Richard Demarco Gallery, Edinburgh
Jewish Festival Exhibition, Edinburgh Hebrew Congregation Community Centre
Leith A1 Gallery and Marchmont Studios, Edinburgh
Pen & Ink Miniatures, Kelly's Gallery, Edinburgh
Peter Potter Gallery, Haddington & Rachel's, Royal Botanic Gardens, Edinburgh International Festival
The Brass Rail & La Grande Cafetier, Edinburgh
Dunedin Gallery, Edinburgh
Creelers, Edinburgh
Lyceum Theatre, Edinburgh
Leo Beck center London
W.A.S.P.S., Studios Patriothall Gallery

Works shown

Royal Academy, Royal Scottish Academy, Heriot-Watt University, The Chantry, Co. Wexford, City of Aberdeen Art Gallery, Blue & White Gallery & Associates, Jerusalem, Florida, Buenos Aires, Royal Scottish Society of Painters in Watercolours, Edinburgh Printmakers' workshop, Morrison Award, Hebrew Society of Argentina sparing 1992 Art Exhibition, Society of Scottish Artists, WASPS.

Permanent collections

Heriot-Watt University
Sternberg Centre
Edinburgh College of Art
Edinburgh Hebrew Congregation
National Portrait Gallery of Scotland
Blue & White Gallery
St. Mary's Music School in Edinburgh

Tutorial career

Blue & White Gallery, Jerusalem
Marchmont Studio and Gillis Centre Studio, Edinburgh
Jews Art EJLS, Council for Christians and Jews and Garnet Hill Centre, Glasgow
Boroughmuir, various schools, and community centres, Edinburgh

Personal life

Spark and his mother Muriel at times had a strained relationship. They had a falling out when Robin's Orthodox Judaism prompted him to petition for his late great-grandmother to be recognized as Jewish. (Muriel's maternal grandparents, Adelaide Hyams and Tom Uezzell, had married in a church. Tom was Anglican. Adelaide's father was Jewish, but her mother was not; Adelaide referred to herself as a "Jewish Gentile.") Muriel reacted by accusing him of seeking publicity to advance his career as an artist. Muriel's brother Philip, who had become actively Jewish, agreed with her version of the family's history. During one of her last book signings in Edinburgh, she told a journalist who asked if she would see her son again: "I think I know how best to avoid him by now."