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Jack Bilbo

Jack Bilbo (1907-67) was born Hugo Baruch in Berlin. A self-taught artist, adventurer, author, gallery owner, egotist and legendary bohemian, he was forced to leave Germany after campaigning against the Nazis, and eventually settled in London in 1936. After internment in 1939 on the Isle of Man, he returned to London and founded the Modern Art Gallery in 1941 where he showed works by Picasso and Schwitters alongside unknown artists.  After the war, he moved to Weybridge where he created giant primitive figures in cement which were later dynamited after he moved on to France in the early 1950s. Bilbo eventually returned to his native Berlin.

The first solo exhibition since his death in 1967 was held at England & Co in 1988 - a retrospective that led to the British Museum acquiring the set of macabre ink drawings that he made for his book Out of My Mind (1946). Another exhibition in 1990, Jack Bilbo and The Moderns focused on his idiosyncratic gallery and the artists he championed. Bilbo was featured in Outsiders & Co (1996); Obsessive Visions: Art Outside the Mainstream (2001); Wandering Lines ii (2012); and Between Worlds: Rituals & Pagan Rites (2013). A substantial group of his drawings from the late 1940s were  included in the exhibition Twelve-Fisted Boxing Caterpillar: Jack Bilbo & Ben Woodeson 10 April - 3 May 2014.

England & Co have represented the Estate of Jack Bilbo since 1988. In 2014, the gallery collaborated on a solo exhibition of Bilbo's works at the David Zwirner gallery, London. In 2017, England & Co liaised with the artist Daniel Richter when he curated an exhibition of works and associated ephemera by Bilbo at the Max Liebermannhaus/Stiftung Brandenburger Tor to accompany an exhibition of his own work.



BIOGRAPHY   
 
Paintings   

Drawings & works on paper



'I Don't Like Private Capitalism...' - Details


'I Don't Like Private Capitalism...'
14 x 11 inches
Blue ink on paper

Private collection



Letzter Akt - Details


Letzter Akt c 1946
11.5 x 10.25 inches
Ink on paper

Private collection



Todestanz - Details


Todestanz c 1946
11.5 x 9.75 inches
Ink on paper

Private collection



Vergeudetes Leben - Details


Vergeudetes Leben
12 x 9.75 inches
Ink on paper

Private collection



Dressur - Details


Dressur c 1947
12 x 10 inches
Inks on paper

Das Opfer - Details


Das Opfer c 1947
12 x 10 inches
Ink on paper

Death Knows No Frontiers... - Details


Death Knows No Frontiers...
14 x 11 inches
Blue ink on paper

Private collection



Progress - Details


Progress
14 x 11 inches
Blue ink on paper

Woman Expecting Triplets Returning Home<br>from the Cinema - Details


Woman Expecting Triplets Returning Home
from the Cinema
1948
14.25 x 10 inches
Ink on paper

Private collection



Trianugneophilio - Details


Trianugneophilio (Triangular Love)
14.5 x 10.75 inches
Ink on paper

Reserved



Juggling with an Inferiority Complex - Details


Juggling with an Inferiority Complex
14.5 x 10.5 inches
Ink on paper
Reserved

Jenseits... - Details


Jenseits... (Time Won't Wait) 1948
12 x 10 inches
Ink on paper

Private collection



'Albert Draw the Curtains! That Poor Girl Out There Is Breaking My Heart!' - Details


'Albert Draw the Curtains! That Poor Girl Out There Is Breaking My Heart!'
14 x 11 inches
Blue ink on paper

Private collection



If the State Would Give Its Writers, Musicians and Artists... - Details


If the State Would Give Its Writers, Musicians and Artists...
14 x 11 inches
Blue ink on paper

Private collection



'Anything to Be Original', Say the Boheemohomians<br> - Details


'Anything to Be Original', Say the Boheemohomians
(The He-Shees)
14 x 11 inches
Blue ink on paper
Reserved

Our Heritage - Details


Our Heritage
14 x 11 inches
Blue ink on paper

Private collection



The state is a Heartless Machine... - Details


The state is a Heartless Machine...
14 x 11 inches
Blue ink on paper

Private collection



Liberty - Details


Liberty
14 x 11 inches
Blue ink on paper

The Hangman Is a Respectable Citizen...' - Details


The Hangman Is a Respectable Citizen...'
14 x 11 inches
Blue ink on paper

Reserved



'We Shall Fight...' - Details


'We Shall Fight...'
14 x 11 inches
Blue ink on paper

My Dear, Dear Public... - Details


My Dear, Dear Public...
14 x 11 inches
Blue ink on paper

Hostess with Thought-Reading Apparatus <br>and Anti-Blush Blotting Machine - Details


Hostess with Thought-Reading Apparatus
and Anti-Blush Blotting Machine
c 1949
11.25 x 8.75 inches
Ink on paper

Private collection



Moon Flapper - Details


Moon Flapper
14.75 x 10.5 inches
Black ink on paper

Reserved



Pastime - Details


Pastime
14.75 x 10.5 inches
Black ink on paper

Untitled - Details


Untitled
10 x 14 inches
Black ink on paper

The Sound-Atom Listener - Details


The Sound-Atom Listener
14.75 x 11 inches
Ink on paper

The Early Morning Grouse - Details


The Early Morning Grouse
10.5 x 14.5 inches
Black ink on paper

Adam and Eve - Details


Adam and Eve
14 x 11 inches
Blue ink on paper

Private collection



Violence Doesn't Stop Violence - Details


Violence Doesn't Stop Violence
14 x 11 inches
Blue ink on paper

Five Politicians Trying to Get the Vote of the Village Idiot - Details


Five Politicians Trying to Get the Vote of the Village Idiot
14 x 11 inches
Blue ink on paper

Reserved



Untitled - Details


Untitled
14 x 11 inches
Blue ink on paper

Untitled - Details


Untitled
14 x 11 inches
Blue ink on paper

Metamorphosis - Details


Metamorphosis 1952
12.5 x 9.5 inches
Pencil on paper

Untitled - Details


Untitled
14 x 11 inches
Black ink on paper

The Coupon-Couponatti-Coupon-Nutty<br> - Details


The Coupon-Couponatti-Coupon-Nutty
(British Austerity Dog)
14 x 11 inches
Black ink on paper

Superiority Complex - Details


Superiority Complex
14 x 10 inches
Black ink on paper

'Magnificent Magnus' - Details


'Magnificent Magnus'
14 x 9 inches
Crayon and pencil on paper

Gigantic Films Inc Casting Office - Details


Gigantic Films Inc Casting Office
13.25 x 10 inches
Black ink on paper

Gespenst – Im Kommen Oder Im Gehen ? ? ? - Details


Gespenst – Im Kommen Oder Im Gehen ? ? ?
14.25 x 9.5 inches
Black ink on paper