Item HAL/1/10 - Drawing of St Mary's Castlegate, York

William Patrick Hall, also known as Patrick Hall, was born in York on 16 December 1906. While still a teenager, he worked on a conservation project restoring the stained glass windows of York Minster, and also had a spell working in the family tanning business at Earswick while studying art on a part-time basis. He studied part-time at both the York and Northampton Art Schools and showed an early aptitude for etching and drypoint work.

During World War Two, the War Artists' Advisory Committee commissioned Hall to produce a number of watercolours depicting the training of paratroopers at the Parachute Training School at RAF Ringway in Cheshire. After the war Hall moved to London and set up a studio and worked full-time as an artist. He had a number of solo exhibitions, mainly focusing on landscapes and town scenes, at the Waddington Gallery, Gilbert Parr Gallery and at the Marjore Parr Gallery. He also showed works at the Royal Academy, the New English Art Club and the Paris Salon. Works by Hall are held in the collection of the Guildhall in London, the Imperial War Museum and the National Gallery of Australia. For the last twenty years of his life, Hall lived in Sellindge and died at Ashford in Kent on 10 June 1992.