David John obituary

As an artist and sculptor, David John, pictured in 2019, fulfilled almost 900 commissions over 66 years. Photograph: Rahoul Ghose

My friend David John, who has died aged 95, was an artist and sculptor who played a notable part in raising the quality of Catholic church furnishings in the postwar decades.

David’s first major commissions were with the Liverpool architect FX (Francis Xavier) Velarde, providing sculpture and furnishings for the shrine church of Our Lady of Lourdes, Blackpool (1955-57), and St Luke, Pinner (1958). Also in 1958, he completed a bronze Madonna for the crypt of Liverpool Metropolitan Cathedral. His last commission (in 2017) was for a set of Stations of the Cross at Our Lady of Lourdes, Wanstead, east London.