Artist profile

Painter Stephen Farthing studied at St Martin’s School of Art from 1969 to 1973 before completing a Masters Degree in Painting at the Royal College of Art in 1976. While at the Royal College, Farthing was offered an Abbey Major Scholarship, an honour which took him to the British School in Rome for a year.

On his return to London, Farthing held his first solo exhibition at the Royal College of Art Gallery. Then, in 1989, Farthing represented Britain at the Sao Paolo Biennale, which led to a flurry of further solo shows around the world in the ensuing years, as well appearances in group exhibitions. In the same year as the Sao Paolo Biennale, Farthing became Artist in Residence at the Hayward Gallery. He joined the ranks of our Royal Academicians in 1998 and in 2000 was made an Emeritus Fellow of St Edmund Hall, Oxford.

As a lecturer and tutor, Farthing has held positions at institutions including Canterbury College of Art, the Royal College of Art, West Surrey College of Art, the Ruskin School of Fine Art and the New York Academy of Art in Manhattan.