CHUCK Mitchell spent most of his adult life at Glasgow School of Art, firstly as a distinguished student and latterly as a lecturer in printed textiles design. He was a protege of Bob Stewart, the highly gifted and innovative teacher/designer/artist who t
ook that department to great heights in the sixties and seventies.
Chuck was similarly a quixotic, prolific, and multi-talented artist. His vision and means of expressing Scottish landscape and its mythology was truly unique and an inspiration to those fortunate enough to benefit from it. Born in Newarthill
in 1939, of Scottish and Lithuanian descent and educated at Our Lady's High in Motherwell, the young Charles could well have aspired to life in a seminary. Even in his prime as an artist and educator, Chuck was a shy, introspective man who often masked t
his with his characteristic, larger than life enthusiasm, colourful presence and earthy humour.
Chuck Mitchell was awarded a Diploma by the School in 1963 and, after a period of postgraduate studies, joined the staff in 1964. A rock-pool abandoned by the tide, sheep with crows on their backs, early morning mist on a river disturbed by heron's wings
- he witnessed these and other such natural phenomena and translated the experiences into works of art.
Huge Ballachulish slates worked over with pigment squeezed from tubes were burnished until the colour glistened with deep resonance through blackness. These were his trademark. His slates show a profound but contemporary understanding of the work of Marga
ret McDonald Mackintosh in her gesso panels of the early 1900s.
His drawings could be as visually witty and dynamic as those of Paul Klee - their content as poignant as the words of a Celtic bard. Bogles and beasties cavorting in night light often filled his frame. Chuck was a superb angler and there are memories of
him, dram on table, pipe in mouth, drawing in his sketchbook and telling fishing stories, often against himself, which would have the company falling about in laughter. Great crack from a great man. Chuck became seriously ill just as the School of Art was
about to mount his first one man show in a number of years. Sadly, the exhibition was called off. When it is mounted, it will bear witness to his prodigious output, his sense of humour, and melancholia for a Scotland sadly disappearing. Chuck Mitchell di
ed on September 30. He is survived by his wife Alison and daughter Katie.
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