Born: 18 February 1927, United Kingdom
Died: 6 August 2008
Country most active: United Kingdom
Also known as: Jean Bratby
The following is excerpted from Infinite Women creator Allison Tyra’s book Uncredited: Women’s Overlooked, Misattributed, and Stolen Work.
In more than one critic’s opinion, painter Jean Cooke was at least as talented as, if not more talented than, her husband John Bratby. He reputedly forced her to stop signing her work with her married name, out of jealousy at her success. Per The Times’s obituary on Jean, “[John] feared and resented the competition she offered to his reputation as the one and only painting Bratby.” He also limited the amount of time she was “allowed” to work on her art, and would paint over her canvases, ostensibly because he needed one for himself. But the fact that he also slashed her canvases when he was “displeased” suggests he painted over her works out of reasons more personal than practical. As Art UK notes, “Jean Cooke lived and painted in his shadow, and it is a sign of her prodigious output that she is remembered at all, her work surviving against all the odds.”