I encountered Alan Gouk in the early 1980s at what was then St Martin’s School of Art in Charing Cross Road, central London. As a fresh-faced foundation student from a Midlands college on a group visit, I found it alien and intimidating, although wondrous and exciting.
Alan showed us around with an air of calm, explaining in detail the process of art making, the current students’ work and the artist/lecturers’ role as part of a truly creative mix, without hierarchy or status. Eventually I went to a northern institution, but I always remember the very human face he gave to what I perceived of then as a cultural world impenetrable to someone like me, his generosity of spirit and his welcoming egalitarian approach.
