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12 Craigie Aitchison CBE RSA RA (1926-2009) Craigie Aitchison was born in Scotland and worked in London and Italy. He studied law at Edinburgh University before moving to London to practice at Middle Temple. In 1952 he studied art at the Slade School and in 1955 was awarded a British Council Scholarship. Between 1968-84 Aitchison was a part-time teacher at the Chelsea School of Art. He became a Royal Academician in 1988. His works are held in many collections including the Tate Gallery and the National Galleries of Scotland. He was awarded a CBE 1999. Aitchison once said, "The Crucifixion is the most horrific story I have ever heard, they were all ganging up against one person. As long as the world exists one should attempt to record that." The landscape which forms this abstract backdrop is stripped back to its most basic representational form: a gentle green cone, the outline of which suggests Holy Island off the Isle of Arran. This silhouette reappears throughout Aitchison's work, here holding back or welcoming a pink dawn of radioactive or supernatural brightness. Christ on the cross burns with a purer, white light. Unlike other more downcast Crucifixions from this period where the Christ-figure is contained below the horizon line, here his form breaks through the outline of the hill beyond as though to suggest the resurgence of the resurrection. Not only the subject of his painting, light and colour are also carefully managed in the artist's technical application of paint. Christ's radiant body, on the other hand, only achieves a higher resonance by judicious dark lines structuring his face. Although these details appear naive, a sophisticated handling of paint places the artist and his work firmly within his post-war milieu alongside Bacon and Freud. In Crucifixion 8 his transcendent imagery reaches its full, unbridled power. However, when applied to such an intensely personal location such as the view of Holy Island from Arran where he lived and worked for parts of the year, Aitchison's religious vision is released to a realm of common human experience. One of his largest and most impressive paintings, it speaks through a personal register on a dramatic scale which illustrates his remarkable contribution to the figurative painting of his age. Crucifixion 8, 1985-86 Oil on Canvas 221 x 188cm Courtesy of Piano Nobile Gallery www.piano-nobile.com Sometimes we get so familiar with an image it can lose its power to challenge and illuminate our lives. What might this picture say to you about how you understand or feel about this event? What has it to say about the world we live in now?