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About John Meyer

History, film and art are my great passions. I feel extremely fortunate to do what I do. I always wanted to be a painter since I was a child and fulfilling that dream has been a privillage.

I work alone, searching for the details, anything that may help me build an understanding of the work. It is difficult to explain how I arrive at an image. It sometimes can take months to find what I want. I literally have several images waiting for a final input that can take it to completion at any given time. 

I am a fan of Classical, Impressionist and Realist art, my two greatest inspirations are Velázquez and Degas. I often travel to a city to seek out one piece of art. Velázquez’s Las Meninas in Madrid and the portrait of Pope Innocent X in Rome, Titian’s The Assumption of the Virgin’ in Venice, Degas’ Danseuses Bleues in Paris to name a few.
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John Meyer is at the forefront of the realist movement in Southern Africa. Decidedly contemporary in his unique vision and as a student of modernism, Meyer has maintained a commitment to representational painting. Apart from landscapes, figurative works and portraiture, Meyer has painted 5 series of fifteen large canvases on the Anglo Boer War, the life of Nelson Mandela, Migrations, the life of Queen Elizabeth II and the Planet Series.

Throughout his career Meyer has held many solo exhibitions at the Everard Read Gallery in Cape Town, Johannesburg and London, David Findley in New York, Stremmel Gallery in Reno Nevada, Gottorf Museum in Germany, Albemarle Gallery and Saatchi Gallery in London, Bonhams in London and Edinburgh, the Melbourne Museum in Australia and Aukland’s Eden Park in New Zealand.

John Meyer has been represented by the Everard Read Gallery for more than five decades. 

History and art are my great passions. It is important to preserve places like Venice for the generations to come.

I have gathered research from the most remote places on all seven continents of the earth as well as the Arctic. I have travelled from there to Antarctica, the Amazon, French Polynesia, all over Europe, Far East Asia and more. It inspires me to paint what I have seen.

The Norwegian Fjords are breathtaking. I like to be silent in my thoughts when I am absorbing all the details of my surroundings.

I work alone, searching out the details, building my understanding of the complete work.

I have been everywhere that I have painted except space. I would give anything to go there.

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