Frank Creber CV
Frank Creber is an artist and project manager at the Bromley by Bow Centre in East London. Since the 1990s, he has produced extensive topographical sketches and paintings documenting the changing urban landscape of the East End. His work captures the area’s physical and social transformation, retelling stories of local families through memory and observation. Since 2004, his studio practice has included numerous figure drawings that combine lived experience with recollection, forming a personal visual chronicle of East London’s evolution.
In 2005, Creber was appointed Director of Visual Arts for Water City CIC, leading collaborative education and exhibition programmes involving over 1,000 children and 200 artists and musicians. That year he also became artist-in-residence (2005–2012) for Water City, documenting major regeneration from the Olympic Park to East India Dock. His drawings and paintings record both the ambition of renewal and the tensions it creates for local communities. With more than twenty years’ experience in Bow, he explores the complex relationship between redevelopment and the people it seeks to serve.
An accomplished curator, Creber has a strong interest in the natural environment and its impact on wellbeing in the inner city. His thematic concerns include the power and industrial heritage of East London, micro-communities along the waterways, portraits of contemporary Londoners, the importance of tress and parks historically an aspect of victorian impulse to clean up the air in London, and the enduring image of trees in Western art as symbols of growth, memory and spiritual space.
A founding artist of the Bromley by Bow Centre in 1986, Creber served as Creative Director until 2010 and continues as a lead artist. Born in 1959, he studied Painting at the University of Newcastle upon Tyne (BA, 1981) and at Chelsea College of Art (MA, 1987). His awards include the Herbert Read Fellowship at Chelsea, the Barclays Bank Young Painters Award and the Pickering Fellowship at Kingston. In 2008, he was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts for his work in community arts with young people.
Creber grew up in Buckinghamshire after his parents, both dedicated teachers, moved from Wembley to the Chilterns. His family background includes Jewish refugee heritage on his mother’s side and public service and scientific research on his father’s, influences that have shaped his social awareness and outlook.
Forthcoming and Current Exhibitions
A proposal has been accepted for a solo show at the chain store Trinity Boot Wharf 2027, ‘The River Thames’, with 50 paintings on themes of:-The Power and Industrial Heritage of the Thames, Micro-Communities Along the River, Portraits of Contemporary Londoners. The use of timber industry as part of shipbuilding.
A solo show at Artful Greenwich on the History, heritage and community life go Greenwich, including the Queen Ann Tree an the 400 year old chestnut trees.
Group Show, TRACES OF HUMANITY 2026, London and Gibraltar
Previous Exhibitions
Whitechapel Stories Heritage Mural, Sidney Street, Whitechapel London, Funded by The Heritage Lottery Funded
2025 Open Studios and Exhibition The Bromley by Bow Centre, London
2025 Whitechapel Stories Heritage Mural, Sidney Street, Whitechapel London, Funded by The Heritage Lottery Funded
2025 Group Show Friends Together, House of Denna, Woolwich, London
2024 In the Footsteps of he East London Group, Nunnery Gallery London
2024 Group Show Forests Woods and Trees At the BT Batsford Gallery London
2024 Solo Show Sailing Paintings At The Viewing Room, Thames-Side Studios,Harrington Way, Warspite Rd, London SE18 5NR
2023 Solo Show, Making Space, 48 Aberfeldy, Poplar St London
2022 Group Show Bermondsey Project Space starting Dec 2022/ Jan 2023
2022 Group Show TERRA Espacio Gallery, London, 17 - 23 Oct 2022
2022 Group show ‘The Urban Sublime’ Coningsby Gallery London
2022 Two Person show ‘Roaming our City’ AGIP Highgate London
2022 Group Show ‘Trees and the Sacred’ Norwich Cathedral
2022 Group Show ‘The Tree of Life’ Stanton Guildhouse, Gloucestershire
2020 Group show ‘Being with Trees’ Bermondsey project Space
2020 Group show ‘Being with Trees’ Gustavo Galleria Gibraltar
2020 Solo Show Thames-side Studios Gallery
2019 Group Print Show at the Lounge, Thames-side Studios, Charlton
2019 Open Studios at Thames-side Studios, Charlton
2019 Lost and Found (working title) with Ferha Farouqui at Lumen Space, Tavistock, London
2019 Good and Bad Government, with Michael Johnson and John Clark, at Alison Richards Building, Cambridge University
2019 URBAN CONTEMPORARIES, Espacio Gallery, London.
2018 Time Warp, Group Show, Espacio Gallery, London.
2018 A Country Far Away, Group Show, London and Bad Oeynhausen, Germany
2018 The collection, Group Show, Bromley by Bow Centre.
2018 Good Government Bad Government, Group Show, Thames-side studios, London.
2017 Solo show drawings, Citywood, London.
2017 Solo show, Quaker Friends House, St. Martins Lane, London.
2017 Solo show, Industville, London.
2016 Group Show, Misbehaviour, Mile End Pavilion, London.
2016 Solo Show Tower of London, Large Mural.
2016 Solo shows - 100%Optical, ExCeL, London,
2016 Solo show Cafe East, Roman Road, Cityscapes and works about Lower Clapton Road Hackney
2015 Group Show Opens Studios Bromley by Bow Centre
2015 Solo Show Level39 8 Paintings from drawing residnecy
2015 Group Show Misbehaviour at Mile End pavilion
2014 Solo shows - Walking on Water, ExCeL, London, Lloyd's Register, London
2013 Solo show - Queen Mary University, People’s Palace,
2013 Group shows - Cos Art Walk. The Art of Writing, London
2012 Solo shows - The View Tube, Olympic Site, London. ’What the River Sings’ Trinity Buoy Wharf, Solo show, Ephasus, Broadway market, London
2012 Group shows - Territories, Bromley By Bow Centre. Territories, group show in Den Helder, Holland.
2011 Solo shows - The Hub, Hackney Marshes. Water City, Trinity Buoy Wharf.
2011 Group Shows - Taste Restaurant, Hammersmith. Hackney Utopians, Stoke Newington Library Gallery. Spring, Smokehouse Gallery, Fish island.
2010 Solo shows Gallery Café, Bethnal Green. Water City, Café 88, Wigmore St. Orchestra in a weekend, Trinity Buoy Wharf, London
2010 Group Shows - Conduit, Smokehouse Gallery, London, La Tuerte, Madrid, Spain,
2009 Solo Show - Fishing Village, Trinity Buoy Wharf, Chainstore, London
2008 Solo Show, Art Space Gallery, London.
2008 Group Shows, The Great Purpose, London. New 2008 English Art Club, London.
2007 Group show, Picker gallery, Kingston upon Thames. Art Space gallery, London.
2006 Solo Show, Art Space Gallery, London
2004 Solo Show, Art Space Gallery, London
2003 Solo Show, Greenham Arts, Newbury
2002 Solo Show, Turtle Arts, Nottingham. Solo Show, Art House, Peterborough
1998 Solo Show, Arthur Andersen, London
1992 Solo Show, Sue Williams Gallery, London
1991 Solo Show, Sue Williams Gallery, London
1989 Artist of the day, Flowers East