Grey Horses

Tom Gentleman was as a Scottish painter and commercial artist. He was the father of noted artist David Gentleman. Tom studied part-time at Glasgow School of Art. He worked as a cartoonist and illustrator in Glasgow for some years before coming to London (1928). In the thirties he was a poster designer for a number of agencies and eventually became head of Shell Studios.

Grey Horses, a popular print, has the marks of a good poster – bright colours with a limited palette range, and stylised, simplified images reduced to flattened blocks of colour. The overall impact gives an upbeat recognition of familiar things. The small boy in blue admiring the McMullen’s brewery horses in Hertford is Tom’s son David, himself now a celebrated graphic artist.

‘Grey Horses’ by Tom Gentleman on display at Jonathan Grant Gallery.