About Graeme Lothian.
Graeme Lothian was born in Sri Lanka (formerly Ceylon) in 1960 to a tea planter family, before moving to Trinidad in the West Indies and finally Kent by the mid-sixties. He gained a place at both Wimbledon and Byam Shaw schools of Art. Graeme decided to go part-time under Gertrude Franklin-White at the Samuel Palmer School of Art in Shoreham. He painted preferentially ‘en plein air’ in the beautiful surrounding West Kent countryside; subsequently holding a one-man show of landscapes in Sevenoaks in 1981.
From 1988/91 Graeme began travelling from India heading more or less continuously eastwards. While living in Sydney, Australia, he painted mostly in and around Circular Quay, Kings Cross and the Paddington areas. The pictures were exhibited in a gallery in the Rocks area at the southern edge of the Harbour Bridge.
During the 1990’s, he was an Aviation artist after a chance meeting with Air Vice-Marshal ‘Johnnie’ Johnson, the top scoring Allied fighter pilot during WWII, at the Biggin Hill air show in 1992 where Graeme had a trade stand for his aviation paintings. The next ten years saw Graeme, in partnership with ‘Johnnie’ producing many limited-edition prints of WWII aviation subjects, carrying the original signatures on each print of the top RAF and Luftwaffe pilots. Each project taking Graeme all over the UK and across Europe to meet the aviators, signing the prints and listening to their truly amazing stories.
At the beginning of the Millenium he started working on a coffee table book of the river Thames, which took over four years to complete. Depicting scenes of the 213mile river from source near Lechlade to Southend on Sea. His second book, this time of London, was published in 2012. During this time one of his portraits was exhibited at the prestigious BP Portrait Awards, National Portrait Gallery, London and had a one-man exhibition of landscapes in Sevenoaks, Kent.
In 2010, Graeme was invited by the Royal Army Medical Corps to be their artist in Camp Bastion hospital, Helmand Province, Afghanistan. He had unprecedented access to all areas of the hospital and there was no brief, just to record the works of the medics and support staff in the Role 3 JFMG hospital. In November 2010, The Royal Society of Medicine, Wimpole Street, London held an exhibition of 84 medic paintings with Graeme showing Sophie, the Duchess of Wessex (now Edinburgh) the story from ‘point of wounding’ to repatriation home for the casualties. The RSM said that over a thousand people a day viewing the exhibition with the BBC and ITV filming the opening night.
Graeme was invited back to Helmand on three further operational tours as the Brigade artist to the Task Force Helmand Commander (General in command) in Lashkar Gah. He is the only artist to have this privilege throughout the Op Herrick campaign. Allowing the rare opportunity to visit all parts of the army’s ‘area of operations’ which included an exciting visit to neighbouring Kandahar Province to paint for IX Tornado Squadron, RAF. In June 2013 Graeme was shot and severely wounded by the Taliban while on foot patrol south of Pan Kalay/Sangin. Casavaced by the USAF Blackhawk ‘Pedro’ team and ironically taking the same route back home, via Camp Bastion that he had depicted in his RSM show in 2010. After finally recuperating, the Gurkhas in 2016 invited him back to Afghanistan, this time to Kabul. An abiding highlight was painting with easel and body armour high up on the hills above Kabul.
He is the only war artist awarded the Operational Service Medal, Afghanistan and the only civilian wounded in the British theatre of operations in Helmand. An Artist in Afghanistan art book was published in 2015 depicting the four tours in Helmand Province. He has appeared on the BBC and Sky Breakfast news, Channel 5, The One Show, BBC Radio 4 ‘World at One’, ITV, War Art with Eddie Redmayne, many times on BBC TV’s South East news and had articles on his time as a war artist in the Sunday Telegraph, Independent, Australian and the Big Issue.
Graeme’s paintings hang in many military messes both here and abroad. An Oxford University College and Oxford boat houses, Royal Military Hospital, Chelsea, National Army Museum, London, golf clubs and collections in Europe, America and Australasia. Graeme has painted in the Middle East; notably Syria, Jordan and Oman being favourites and also Malaysia, Indonesia, Nepal; Australia, NZ and Fiji. In 2018 he had an exhibition at the Spa Gallery on the Pantiles, Tunbridge Wells and most recent works include a large painting of Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II funeral, which now proudly hangs in the Gurkha HQ, Sandhurst. Followed in 2023 by two paintings of Kings Charles III Coronation coming down the Mall.
