Michael Perton’s works are in the public collections of the Arts Council of Great Britain and The Hunterian, University of Glasgow and in numerous private collections.

In 2018, ‘Free Composition (Item 13)’ from the Arts Council collection was selected for inclusion in the exhibition ‘Post-Pop. Beyond the commonplace’ shown at the Calouste Gulbenkian Museum, Lisbon.

Born in London, he studied at Regent Street Polytechnic School of Art, which during his time there (1956-1959) became Chelsea School of Art. His tutors included luminaries Leon Kosoff and Frank Auerbach. His fellow students were Frank Bowling and Patrick Caulfield.

As a gradate he was awarded a number of Scholarships which allowed him to study in Berlin and Munich, where he was artist in residence.

In 1964 he was in the Young Contemporaries. In the same year he won the Chelsea Prize. He had a solo show at the Whitechapel in 1972. His work was selected for the Hayward Annual in 1976. And in 1981 he was described in an appraisal in the Arts Review as an ‘up and coming artist’.

As a group exhibitor he was in numerous shows, including The John Moores Liverpool Exhibition and the Royal Academy Summer Show.

He taught at the Waltham Forest School of Art/ North East London Polytechnic alongside Derek Boshier.

A driven, passionate, and ambitious artist, his early painting was figurative, then semi figurative, moving to abstract, becoming graphic and controlled: the canvas gridded up onto which marks were notated, stencilled or collaged. This technique developed into a sophisticated and elegant series of large works in the late 70’s. All works originated as drawings that were scaled up; he drew constantly. In the 80’s and 90’s, his interest in mediation became his lens. He began to paint directly onto canvas without preparatory drawings. The marks were looser, more dynamic with larger brush strokes. Curves and circles replaced the angular aspects of his earlier abstract works but the painting still had considered composition.