Cambridge School of Art

The original School of Art was opened in 1858 by renowned British art critic, draughtsman, watercolourist and prominent social thinker John Ruskin. It has remained well-regarded ever since. Legendary cartoonist and graphic artist Ronald Searle studied here, as did Edward Bawden, one of Britain’s greatest graphic artists, illustrators and printmakers, and Gustav Metzger, the pioneer of auto-destructive art. In 1953 Odile Crick, a lecturer at Cambridge School of Art, drew the original sketch of the DNA double helix, to illustrate the pioneering work by geneticists Crick and Watson at Cambridge University. During the highly creative and experimental 1960's, the School was home to many talented tutors and gifted students, including caricaturists Roger Law and Peter Fluck of Spitting Image fame and Pink Floyd members Syd Barrett and Dave Gilmour, who played one of their first gigs from the balcony of the Ruskin studios at Christmas 1966. Other alumni and staff have included Chloe Cheese, Adrian Ryan, Walter Hoyle, Paul Hogarth and Principal John Bolam. The art school has since grown grew to become an integral part of Anglia Ruskin University, and it’s still at the heart of the modern-day campus in Cambridge.