John Nash (1893-1977)

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John Northcote Nash was a British painter of landscapes and still-lives, and a wood engraver and illustrator, particularly of botanic works. He was the younger brother of Paul Nash.

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Nash was born in London and was educated at Langley Place and afterwards at Wellington College. He had no formal art training, but was encouraged by his brother to develop his abilities as a draughtsman. His early work was in watercolour and included Biblical scenes, comic drawings and landscapes. A joint exhibition with Paul in 1913 was successful, and John was invited to become a founder-member of the London Group in 1914. In 1915 Nash joined Harold Gilman in Robert Bevan's Cumberland Market Group and in May that year exhibited with Gilman, Charles Ginner and Robert Bevan.

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During the First World War John Nash served in the Artists Rifles, the unit that his brother had joined in 1914 before taking a commission in the Hampshire Regiment. On the recommendation of Paul, he worked as an official war artist from 1918. Nash's most famous painting is Over the Top now hanging in the Imperial War Museum.

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After the First World War, Nash's efforts went mainly into painting landscapes. Eric Newton, the art historian said of him "If I wanted a foreigner to understand the mood of a typical English landscape, I would show him Nash's best watercolours." Emotions, however, concerning the war continued to linger for many years; and this was depicted in his landscape painting. In 1919 he became a member of the New English Art Club, an Associate of the Royal Academy in 1940, a full member in 1951 and became a Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE) in 1964. His retrospective exhibition at the Royal Academy in 1967 was the first for a living painter.