Born in Wembley, he studied at the Willesden School of Art (1935–38) under Ernest Heber Thompson, and at the Royal College of Art (1946–49). He was for many years principal lecturer in fine art at the Sir John Cass School of Art. He was elected fellow of the Royal Society of British Sculptors in 1967, and won its Silver medal in 1972. Between 1982 and 1985 he lived in Japan. Work which he showed at an exhibition at the Hattingen Art Society, in Germany, in 1989, bore a strong Japanese imprint. Commissions include City Music (1962), a series of abstract reliefs, on an office building in Ludgate Hill, and Fountainhead (1972), off Motcomb Street, London. Wickham practised as both painter and sculptor, and also wrote for Arts Review and Designed Environment. In 1996 he was registered totally blind, but, with the assistance of David Reading, constructed a large figure of a man with a bird, and produced a series of abstract paintings with the help of Greta Levins.
Source: Buckman, D., Artists in Britain since 1945 (2 vols: A–L, M–Z), Bristol (1998), 2nd edn. 2006.
Philip Ward-Jackson 2011
