20 Facts About Sandra Blow

Sandra Betty Blow was an English abstract painter and one of the pioneers of the British abstract movement of the 1950s.

Sandra Blow later enrolled at the Accademia di Belle Arti in Rome, where she met Alberto Burri, her partner of a few years.

Sandra Betty Blow was born on 14 September 1925 in Newington, London.

Sandra Blow came from a Jewish family; her father, Jacob, who was a fruit wholesaler, and her mother, Leah nee Rubinstein, had three children, Sandra was the second.

In 1934, Sandra Blow suffered with scarlet fever, followed by rheumatic fever, from which her heart never fully recovered.

At the age of fourteen, Sandra Blow was evacuated with her mother and two brothers to Paddock Wood in Kent, near her grandparents' fruit farm, where she spent her time reading, drawing and painting.

Sandra Blow spent a short period in 1947 at the Royal Academy schools, but found the teaching dull, so instead travelled to Italy to study classic art.

Sandra Blow faced the challenge of not only establishing herself as a woman artist in the 1950s but as an abstractionist.

Under Gimpel Fils, Sandra Blow had regular exhibitions and secured her first solo show in New York.

In 1957, Sandra Blow moved to St Ives for one year and would return there years later to live permanently.

In 1961, Sandra Blow began teaching painting at the Royal College of Art, where she remained until 1975 and earned a position as honorary fellow, whilst painting in her studio in Chelsea, London.

Sandra Blow was elected to the Royal Academy in 1978.

Sandra Blow in turn had been influenced by Hans Hofmann.

Sandra Blow was influenced by Alberto Burri, who was progressing towards abstract art informel, using materials such as sacking.

Sandra Blow's work was at the forefront of the British abstract art movement of the 1950s.

Sandra Blow was one of the most original woman painters in Britain, challenging the "'macho' cult" surrounding abstract art.

One well-known piece by Sandra Blow, illustrating her improvisatory approach to the use of materials, Space And Matter, 1959, is a painting of oil on board plus other experimental materials, creating the impression of wood and tar as well as flame and sea spray.

Sandra Blow lived in a flat in South Kensington, London, since the 1960s but was forced to move due to rising rents.

Sandra Blow never had children, which had been a purposeful decision in her twenties, but she later regretted it.

Sandra Blow died at the Royal Cornwall Hospital after a heart valve replacement operation resulted in a cerebral haemorrhage.