William Mitchell (sculptor)

William George Mitchell (born 1925) is an English sculptor, artist and designer. He is best known for his large scale concrete murals and public works of art from the 1960s and 1970s. His work is often of an abstract or stylised nature with its roots in the traditions of craft and "buildability". His use of heavily modelled surfaces created a distinctive language for his predominantly concrete and glass reinforced concrete (GRC) sculptures. After long years of neglect, many of William Mitchell’s remaining works in the United Kingdom are now being recognised for their artistic merit and contemporary historic value, and have been granted protective, listed status.

William Mitchell was born in 1925 in London's Maida Vale. Serious illness in his early years and extensive periods in hospitals and convalescent homes, resulted in virtually no schooling.

In 1938 Mitchell was apprenticed to an established London firm of decorators, where he was taught the basics of the trade, and developed a taste for the history and tradition of the craft. A three-year period of service in the Royal Navy followed after which he got a job painting scenes and panoramic views for the Navy, Army and Air Force Institutes (NAAFI), refurbishing and decorating their clubs and canteens across the world. After working for the Pearl Insurance Company as an Insurance Agent, Mitchell earned and saved enough money to pay for a more formal art education which included time at The Southern College of Art in Portsmouth and the Royal College of Art in London where he studied woods, metals and plastics and won both the Silver Medal and the prestigious Abbey Award entitling him to a fourth post-graduate year at the British School at Rome.

Upon his return from Italy, (where he had spent time in the offices of Gio Ponti, Pier Luigi Nervi and Pininfarina), Mitchell replied to an advertisement in one of the daily newspapers for a designer or artist to assist the London County Council Architects Department to design and produce decorative works for the many new developments then springing up across the City. His success in winning this appointment set him upon a course that enabled him to work with some of the UK’s most respected builders, architects and engineers of the time including Sir Frederick Gibberd, Sir Basil Spence, The Building Design Partnership and Sir Ove Arup.

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