Sir [Arthur] Leigh [Bolland] Ashton (1897-1983) was Director of the Victoria & Albert Museum from 1945 to 1955. A graduate of Winchester and Balliol College, Oxford, he joined the Victoria & Albert Museum in 1922 as an assistant in the Architecture and Sculpture Department. He was transferred to the Department of Textiles in 1925 and then in 1931 to the Department of Ceramics. He was involved with the 1935-36 International Exhibition of Chinese Art at the Royal Academy. He became Keeper of Special Collections and Assistant to the Director in 1937. After war service, he returned to the V&A as Director in 1945, retiring in 1955.
Published sources
The Times, Obituary, 17 March 1983, p.14.
'Sir Leigh Ashton', Burlington Magazine 97, No.632, November 1955. |
