The Birmingham Artists Committee was an English

England

England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...

 artist collective

Artist collective

An artist collective is an initiative that is the result of a group of artists working together, usually under their own management, towards shared aims...

 that organised exhibitions of painting

Painting

Painting is the practice of applying paint, pigment, color or other medium to a surface . The application of the medium is commonly applied to the base with a brush but other objects can be used. In art, the term painting describes both the act and the result of the action. However, painting is...

 and sculpture

Sculpture

Sculpture is three-dimensional artwork created by shaping or combining hard materials—typically stone such as marble—or metal, glass, or wood. Softer materials can also be used, such as clay, textiles, plastics, polymers and softer metals...

 in Birmingham

Birmingham

Birmingham is a city and metropolitan borough in the West Midlands of England. It is the most populous British city outside the capital London, with a population of 1,036,900 , and lies at the heart of the West Midlands conurbation, the second most populous urban area in the United Kingdom with a...

 between 1947 and 1952.

The committee was organised by the art critic Robert Melville

Robert Melville (art critic)

Robert Melville was an English art critic and journalist.Along with the artists Conroy Maddox and John Melville , he was a key member of the Birmingham Surrealists in the 1930s and 1940s...

 and artists including Oscar Mellor

Oscar Mellor

Oscar Mellor was an English surrealist artist and publisher of poetry. An associate of the Birmingham Surrealists in the 1940s, he founded the Fantasy Press in the 1950s, publishing works by poets such as Philip Larkin, Kingsley Amis and Thom Gunn.Although he became best known as a publisher, he...

 and Trevor Denning

Trevor Denning

Trevor Denning RBSA was an English artist, sculptor, writer, and former art teacher.-Biography:Denning was born in Moseley, Birmingham, studying painting and graphics at the Birmingham School of Art from 1938 to 1942 and teaching there between 1945 and 1985.In 1947 he was one of the founders of the...

 to break the stranglehold of the conservative Royal Birmingham Society of Artists

Royal Birmingham Society of Artists

The Royal Birmingham Society of Artists or RBSA is a learned society of artists and an art gallery based in the Jewellery Quarter in Birmingham, England. it is both a registered charity. and a registered company The Royal Birmingham Society of Artists or RBSA is a learned society of artists and an...

 on the exhibition of work by living artists in the city.

Its exhibitions were an important post-war outlet for the Birmingham Surrealists

Birmingham Surrealists

The Birmingham Surrealists were an informal grouping of artists and intellectuals associated with the Surrealist movement in art, based in Birmingham, England from the 1930s to the 1950s....

, showing the work of Conroy Maddox

Conroy Maddox

Conroy Maddox , was an English surrealist painter, collagist, writer and lecturer; and a key figure in the Birmingham Surrealist movement....

, John Melville

John Melville

John Melville was an English surrealist artist, described by Michel Remy in his book Surrealism in Britain as one of the "harbingers of surrealism" in Great Britain....

, Emmy Bridgwater

Emmy Bridgwater

Emma Frith Bridgwater , known as Emmy Bridgwater, was an English artist and poet associated with the Surrealist movement....

 and the young Desmond Morris

Desmond Morris

Desmond John Morris, born 24 January 1928 in Purton, north Wiltshire, is a British zoologist and ethologist, as well as a popular anthropologist. He is also known as a painter, television presenter and popular author.-Life:...

. Other notable artists represented included CoBrA

Cobra

Cobra is a venomous snake belonging to the family Elapidae. However, not all snakes commonly referred to as cobras are of the same genus, or even of the same family. The name is short for cobra capo or capa Snake, which is Portuguese for "snake with hood", or "hood-snake"...

 member William Gear

William Gear

William Gear was a painter, born on 2 August 1915 in Methil in the south-east of Fife, Scotland. Born into a mining family, he studied at Edinburgh College of Art before travelling to Paris to study with Fernand Léger....

 and the sculptor Gordon Herickx

Gordon Herickx

Gordon Herickx was an English sculptor.Born in Birmingham, Herickx won a scholarship in 1914 to study under William Bloye at the Birmingham School of Art, completing his studies after World War I. He assisted Bloye on projects such as the 1933 carvings of the church of St...

.

Although there was no organisational link, The Birmingham Artists Committee was acknowledged as a catalyst by the artists who founded the Ikon Gallery

Ikon Gallery

The Ikon Gallery is an English gallery of contemporary art, located in Brindleyplace, Birmingham. It is housed in the Grade II listed, neo-gothic former Oozells Street Board School, designed by John Henry Chamberlain in 1877. The gallery's current director is Jonathan Watkins.Ikon was set up to...

in 1964.