John Baker

John 'Jack' Baker (1916-2007) was a British stained-glass artist, teacher, conservator and author.

Biography He was a student at the Central School of Arts and Crafts in the late 1930s, where he was a contemporary of Monica Walker and the artist, illustrator and children's author Hilary Stebbing, whom he married in 1946. He worked under James Hogan at the Whitefriars Glass before joining Samuel Caldwell junior at Canterbury Cathedral in 1948 to help reinstate the medieval glass removed for safekeeping during the Second World War. where in 1953-54 he ran the stained glass department with Tom Fair, and his pupils included Robert Sowers and Margaret Traherne. From 1963 he taught at Kingston College of Art.

His work was exhibited at The Architectural Association in January 1956.

Stained glass, mosaic & sculpture

1957, Church of the Holy Name, Bow Common Lane, Mile End: 11 windows 1959, Broomfield Chapel, Abbots Langley: two large abstract windows 1964, Holy Cross Church, Gleadless Valley: 10 large concrete and glass windows, including full height windows of the Virgin Mary and St John 1965–1973, Holy Trinity Cathedral, Auckland, New Zealand: and large window in the transept Canterbury Cathedral: St Stephen's Chapel, in memory of Lang Fisk-Moore, Canterbury St Mary, Ide Hill, Sevenoaks: Nativity, east window The King's School, Canterbury, library St Mary's, Climping: a stylised Madonna and child

Burgher's Chapel, Sheffield Cathedral

Dalle de verre From 1960 to 1965, Baker created a number of dalle de verre windows in churches and chapels, setting slab glass in concrete or resin: Our Lady, St Mary of Walsingham, London Colney (1960); St George, Britwell (1964); Holy Cross Church, Gleadless Valley (1964); St Michaels Convent, Finchley (1965).

Publications 'Secular stained glass', The Architectural Association Journal, December 1955, p. 120 English Stained Glass with an introduction by Herbert Read and photographs by Alfred Lammer, Thames & Hudson, London, 1960 English Stained Glass of the Medieval Period (revised edition of the above), Thames & Hudson, London, 1978