Peter (Spike) Wademan

As a young boy growing up in post-World War II and listening to his father’s stories of the Spitfire planes he flew for the RAF, Wademan found himself drawing planes and battleships on the pavement. Passers-by would comment on how much detail there was in them. His’s interest in all-things military continued through his youth when he joined the Volunteer Airborne Reserves. After training, he was accepted into the British 44th Parachute Brigade, which meant working closely with aircraft and helicopters over the next few years. He also restored many military vehicles and made numerous model planes and sailing ships.

At the same time, Wademan’s obvious talent for drawing was being developed by enrolling for a technical illustration course at The South East Essex College of Art & Technology in East London. He quickly gained a position as junior artist for one of London’s top design studios of the 60s, The Design Group, Lonsdale Hans, and went on to become one of their best illustrators, working for advertising agencies around the world.

After moving to Sydney, Australia in 1974, and with a family to support, he again took up his career as a commercial artist and continued to grow in reputation in his field of illustration for the advertising industry for the next 26 years. Towards the end of this time Wademan started to move into the publishing world creating many book illustrations for fiction (book covers) and non-fiction books, for example Anatomica, The Children’s Atlas, and the Random House Series, Investigators.

It was not until yet another move, this time to Queenstown on the shores of Lake Wakatipu in the South Island of New Zealand, that his long-time love of sailing and all-things historical could be realized. Here, Spike and his wife have bought a wooden 30-foot clinker-built, Norwegian-designed boat to sail on the lake. In the last few years, Wademan has had time to create some stunning marine art.

Wademan has had two “Boys Own” solo exhibitions, and has also had two paintings accepted for the Maritime Art Exhibit, Coos Art Museum, Oregon. He is now a professional member of the International Society of Marine Painters. He has won many local art awards and teaches painting on a regular basis for the Art Society.