Free Burma

Free Burma

Free Burma

By: David Nicholls, 2009
Medium: cast bronze
Size: 100 x 103mm
Cast by: Niagara Falls Castings
Issue: The Medal, no 57 (Autumn 2010)

Edition: 15

Category:

David Nicholls (b. 1948) studied art at Northampton School of Art and privately with the noted mural painter Henry Bird, and subsequently at Oxford University’s Ruskin School of Drawing, where he specialised in drawing and painting the human figure. Having developed a facility for anatomical drawing, he was taken on as museum artist at Oxford’s Museum of Natural History in 1978, working there for nineteen years and undertaking biological illustration, model making, publication design and display work. During this time he became heavily involved in calligraphy and lettering, and was instrumental in setting up Oxford Scribes in 1984, as well as executing calligraphic commissions for various Oxford colleges and institutions. In 1997 he moved to Kent where he now teaches drawing, painting, sculpture and calligraphy to adults at various locations throughout the county as well as regular residential courses elsewhere. Since 1998 he has worked mainly in sculpture, which he has exhibited widely. His medals have won Goldsmiths’ Craft and Design Council awards in 2008, 2009 and 2010. For an account of his work as a medallist, see the artist’s article in the Autumn 2010 issue of The Medal. About his Free Burma medal, he adds: ‘I believe that Aung San Suu Kyi is one of the great heroes of our time, standing up against one of the most oppressive military dictatorships in modern history. It is fitting that she is commemorated with a medal during her lifetime in order in some small way to bring attention to the plight of the Burmese people.’