Sad News: Graham Campbell
Dear Colleagues,I write to share the sad news that Graham Campbell, Professor Emeritus of Fine Arts, passed away on May 7, 2024 at the age of 78.
A native of Kent, England, Graham was born in 1946 to the late William and Constance (Hague) Campbell. After graduating from Birmingham College of Art in 1969, Graham served as assistant head of the Art Department at Rowlinson School in England for six years before resuming his education, this time in the United States, at Yale University, where he earned his MFA in 1978. Graham taught on the faculty at Yale before joining the Brandeis faculty in 1981 as assistant professor of fine arts on the tenure-track, receiving tenure at Brandeis in 1987.
Graham was an abstract painter working primarily in oils on canvas. His work conveyed a deep concern for the human condition and the human figure which was central to his visual world. His paintings were exhibited at shows throughout the UK and the US, in public and private collections, including the Newark Museum, Boston City Hospital, and Brandeis’s own Rose Art Museum. He held solo exhibitions in New York and in Britain, and participated in numerous group shows. Graham was the recipient of a number of prestigious awards for painting, including the 1975 Painter’s Award from the Arts Council of Great Britain, the Louis Comfort Tiffany Foundation Award in 1986, a National Endowment for the Arts grant in 1993, and a John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation Fellowship in 1996, this latter award in a year when only 158 American and Canadian artists, scholars and scientists were selected from among 2,791 applicants.
While known as an “abstract painter,” Graham was passionate about painting in all its forms. He loved taking students to museums. As one alum shared: “For me, he is always so present every time I go to a museum and see a Turner, a Rembrandt or a Manet. He was really such a generous teacher and I learned so much from him.”
Graham is survived by his loving family and friends. I am grateful to Tory Fair and Peter Kalb of the Department of Fine Arts for their contributions to this memoriam.
Sincerely,
Carol A. Fierke
Provost and Executive Vice President for Academic Affairs