Osmund Caine (1914-2004)

Caine was born in Manchester and studied at Birmingham School of Art, where following the War (where he served in the Military Police) he returned to the city, teaching life drawing at Birmingham School of Art. He later moved to London, teaching at the Kingston School of Art and then at Twickenham School of Art, running the school for some twenty years. As well as shows in Britain and France, including the Royal Academy and the New English Art Club, a retrospective exhibition was held at Orleans House Gallery, Twickenham in 1998. He was also a talented stained glass designer and his work includes windows in St Gabriel’s Church, Cricklewood and St Cuthbert’s Church, Copnor. Perhaps his greatest, if somewhat unlikely, claim to fame is that he is accredited with having invented the bikini. In his 1938 work Bathing Beach, Caine conceived of the two part bathing costumes to make his female sitters appear more decent