Henry Ward

Sound and Vision

Episode 445 / Henry Ward is an artist, writer, and educator living in London.

He works primarily as a painter, but also makes drawings and small sculptures. He is interested in exploring the language of paint by investigating the threshold between abstraction and representation.

He was shortlisted for the Trinity Buoy Wharf Drawing Prize in 2018, 2019 and 2022, and longlisted for the Contemporary British Painting Prize 2021. He was included in the inaugural “The Football Art Prize” in 2022. His work has been included in numerous exhibitions. The first substantial publication about his work, “Shed Paintings – Henry Ward”, was published in February 2021 by Hato Press and features 101 works on paper and an essay by Ben Street.

He is the Director for Freelands Foundation and launched the Freelands Painting Prize in 2020. Previously he was Head of Education at Southbank Centre and worked in a variety of roles at Welling School, a Specialist Visual Arts College, where he led on the school’s specialism. In 2002 he established the alTURNERtive Prize, an annual award celebrating outstanding student practice. In 2011 he founded the biannual arts and education periodical, æ. He is a visiting lecturer at UK art schools including Bath Spa University, University of Brighton, Manchester School of Art, Plymouth College of Art and Wolverhampton School of Art, and a mentor on the Turps Art School Correspondence and off-site courses.

He has written and lectured widely on the arts and education, with a particular focus on teaching as an artistic practice. He was an advisor for Martin Gropius Bau, Berlin from 2018-21 and curated a two day event, “Assembly”, investigating approaches to public engagement in 2018 and a follow up, “Assembly II” in 2021.

In 2023 he undertook a residency at the Albers Foundation in Connecticut.