FRANK BOWLING WAS born in Guyana (formerly British Guiana) in 1934. He came to England in 1953. He studied art at Chelsea College of Art,  then at The Royal College of Art. He is the first ‘black’ artist to have been made a member of the Royal Academy of Arts (in 2005). Until 17 January 2027, there is a small exhibition of Bowling’s work at the Fitzwilliam Museum in Cambridge.

Displayed in a circular room, there are about 10 works to be seen. Almost all of them are large images tending towards abstraction,  but some with figurative details. Some of the images have patches of three-dimensional accumulation of paint, sometimes with fragments of material attached. All the works are gloriously colourful. One of them is an impressionist map of the continent where Bowling was born: South America.

The little exhibition is a good example of the idea that ‘small is beautiful’, but most of the exhibits are far from being small.  I  am pleased that I have seen this show.