Charles Debenham and Alexander Debenham

The Debenhams

Foreword by Martin Newell

Charles Debenham (b 1933) paints without prejudice. He portrays the ordinary people and places of that part of England which raised him. A definitive Colchester ‘boy’, he’s rewarded his hometown and its environment with a lifetime of service. The net result has added up to a substantial portfolio; pictures of his unassuming province, which he portrays as being very much at peace with itself. He has captured his fellow countrymen on canvas, almost by stealth, as they go about their daily business. Charles Debenham’s people are caught in unguarded moments, round-shouldered on street benches, eating chips after shopping, or pausing absently with their dogs on leads, outside ordinary houses in quiet side streets

The region of England which the artist depicts is not the same one which visiting royalty might see. There’s been no tidy-up of any sort. For here are the modest townsfolk in their weekday scruff, toting their shopping bags, or talking among themselves. Behind them we see the shopfronts of southern East Anglia, recognisable, as they are today, nestling under their ancient roofs. For these are the tiles and timbers of old farming towns.

For decades, now, rather than years, I’ve often come across this painter, working with brushes and easel on familiar street corners. Here he was, for instance, painting one spring morning, in Wivenhoe churchyard, his white hair billowing out behind him from under a cap. Only days later, I’d catch sight of him again; this time in Colchester itself, halfway down Queen Street, painting a portrait of a kebab shop, while I rattled past on my bicycle.

For all of the various arts funding bodies and their lofty waffling about ‘Art in the Community’, here’s an artist who’s personified the concept for decades. He simply goes out in all weathers, under all lights and just gets on with it. The Arts Council could save themselves an awful lot of money on their seminars and meetings, if they only told their aspiring artists. “That’s old Charles Debenham over there. See what he’s doing? Go and do that. Then come back after a year or so and we might see about getting some funding for you.”

Debenham himself seems fairly fearless, too. He’d have to be in this job. One evening a few years ago, while waiting in the queue to get into the opening of Colchester’s swish new Firstsite Gallery, a protestor accosted him. The tetchy gentleman in question, had for weeks, been bombarding local newspapers and Borough Councillors alike about the high cost of the new building. Now here he was with his placard, in person, aggressively haranguing people up and down the queue. When he came rather too close to the artist himself, Debenham asked him, “D’you want some, then?” The protestor didn’t and he backed off.

In this exhibition, Charles has been paired with another artist of his family, his grandson Alexander Debenham. (b 1983). This was something of a surprise to me. I was informed that the younger man had studied in Florence. Having looked briefly at his work – portraiture, landscapes and still life – I was inclined to ask “When was he in Florence exactly? 1680 maybe? This work is extraordinary. Barely into his 40s, his hand is that of an old master. The salient family similarities between Debenhams Senior and Junior is that they are both excellent artists -- and representational, rather than abstract. It ends there. Alexander Debenham’s work could never be accused of that old critical cliché of realism-gone-photographic. Because it’s better than photographic. It is stunningly good work. I should think that politicians, gangsters and A-listers alike, would be queueing around the block, if Debenham junior ever did anything as vulgar as opening a service called Your Portrait Painted Whilst Your Fame Lasts. I very much doubt he will, however, he probably has rather better things to do.

Meanwhile the idea of exhibiting these two artists together in a country gallery, located within the scenery which forged them both, is an inspired one. Reader, whether by discernment or by chance, if you’ve come this far, you’ve just struck gold. Enjoy it.

Eight Decades of Debenhams at the Easel – and Still Counting!

When my son Alex announced that he was renouncing a successful career in advertising in order to pursue his longstanding love of painting, I was filled with pride. He had proved his worth in one field, and was now ready to follow his real ambition – his art. Just like his grandfather. Alex, like Charles, is possessed of great determination as well as talent, and so he decamped from a smart flat in Kentish town to (literally) a garret in the Village of Arcetri, in the hills above Florence to study at the Charles H. Cecil studios. To save money, Alex walked every day, in the blazing Tuscan heat, to attend classes in the city below, where he acquired the classical techniques, not just in drawing and painting but also in the practical skills that underpin the technical, sometimes grinding his own pigments, mixing the media, and building the canvases. In Florence Alex served an apprenticeship that would have been familiar to generations of painters over several centuries.

In 2015 when Alex was in his second year, I took Charles, then aged 82, to visit. In that Florentine studio, my father shed, not years, but decades. There he was, fully engaged with the tutors and students alike, opining, explaining, eagerly offering the advice that flows from seventy plus years of intense experience, but in the process, being transformed once again into the eager, young student that he had himself been in the early 1950s.

My own early childhood memories are suffused with the smells of an artist’s studio: oil paint; gesso powder; size, and above all, turpentine. My father’s studio at Little Simons was – and still is - a large room dominated by a whole wall of glass (North-facing, of course).

Stacked against the side walls stand row after row of canvases and boards in various stages of completion, from blank to fully framed, but in no particular order. Along his workbench a vast jumble of the equipment essential to his trade is to be found: palette knives; rags, scalpels; jam jars, tins of turpentine, tubes of paint (exclusively Winsor and Newton!) but above all, brushes. Hundreds of them, standing like a field of tulips, arranged in large jugs. And then the easels, great sturdy wooden frames that articulate in a complex manner that is far beyond the comprehension of any non-artist, with sections that can be extended, raised, and tilted; wooden arms that swivel at all angles, and large iron wing nuts to clamp them in place. Giotto asserted that the proof of artistic mastership was the ability to draw a perfect circle freehand – to me it seemed to be the ability to reassemble Dad’s enormous easel after he had returned from an expedition in the field.

Alex now has one of Charles’ easels in his studio in Assington – and I have absolutely no doubt at all that it is sufficiently solid to continue to serve many more generations of artists yet to come; provided of course, that they can sustain the ingenuity to assemble it.

Karl Debenham, April 2025

Charles Debenham

Born Colchester 9th August 1933, married Eilish (who died last year in 2024). Two sons, one daughter

Educated Colchester Royal Grammar School; Studied: Colchester School of Art

Aged 14 Charles Debenham began evening classes at Colchester School of Art, training there as an illustrator full-time from 1948-53; teachers John O’Connor, Blair HughesStanton, Hugh Cronyn, Carel Weight. In the early sixties he was appointed to the list of designers for The Crown Agents. His clients included Anglian Water, British Telecom and National Rivers Authority followed by National Power and National Grid for whom he designed the Central Features for both The London International Boat Show and the World Travel Market; for London Electricity, the costumes and giant floats for The Lord Mayor’s Show and Battersea Easter Parade. At St Paul’s Cathedral he designed The Royal Wedding (Charles & Diana) Exhibition. Debenham was awarded top prize for his pavilion for Bowater, at The International Fair, Cairo 1976. He also designed the USA National Pavilion at Palais Sud, Paris 1980 and Basel Expo 1981. The Merchant Navy commissioned him to create their float for the parade to mark the 50th anniversary of WWII.

Exhibitions

1970 Gainsborough’s House, Sudbury

1980 - 2015 exhibited most years Royal Academy, London

1988 - 2009 exhibited most years Royal West of England Academy Beecroft Art Gallery, Westcliff on Sea, exhibited several times: awarded ‘most distinguished work’ 1995

1996 (with publication); 2000 (with book); 2006 (with publication);

2016 (with booklet) Chappel Galleries, Essex past solo shows

2000 - 2008 South West Academy of Fine Arts

2012 Minories, Colchester ‘Timeplace’ (three person show: Debenham; Howey; Roscorla)

2015 Beecroft Art Gallery, Southend
The Mall Galleries, London: New English Art Club;
Discerning Eye; Royal Institute of Oil Painters
Exhibited with Brotherhood of Ruralists, Bodmin
Exhibited Hayletts Gallery, Essex
Exhibited Geedon Gallery, Essex

2019 ‘The man who painted Colchester and Sudbury’ Chappel Galleries, Essex with booklet (solo show)

2022 Recent Work ‘The Good, the Bad and the Ordinary’ Chappel Galleries (solo show)

2025 Chappel Galleries ‘The Debenhams’

Works in Collections

Sir David Frost; Colchester and Ipswich Museums; Epping Forest District Museum; East Contemporary Art Collection University Campus, Suffolk; Madison Museum of Fine Art, USA; London Electricity National Grid (commissioned)

Publications

‘The Outdoor Paintings by Charles Debenham’ folder of 24 postcards published by Chappel Galleries, Essex 1996

“Charles Debenham East Anglia” by David Buckman, published 2000 John Sampson & Co, Bristol;

Chas Debeham “From the Other Side of the Street” Introduction by the artist published 2006 Firstsite;

‘And Now You See It booklet published by Chappel Galleries, Essex 2016; ‘The man who painted Colchester and Sudbury’ published by Karl Debenham 2018;

‘The man who painted Colchester and Sudbury’ exhibition booklet for sales of paintings published by Chappel Galleries, Essex 2019

A short film ‘The Man Who Painted Colchester’, by Kinura Ltd Jane’s walk event 'A misguided tour around town', organised by Rowena Macaulay 2021