John (1940) Byrne Sold at Auction Prices

Painter

John Patrick Byrne (born 6 January 1940) is a Scottish playwright and artist. He wrote The Slab Boys Trilogy, plays which explore working-class life in Scotland, and the TV dramas Tutti Frutti and Your Cheatin' Heart. Byrne is also a painter, printmaker and theatre designer.

John Byrne was born into a family of Irish Catholic descent in Paisley, Renfrewshire, where he grew up in the Ferguslie Park housing scheme and was educated at the town's St Mirin's Academy before attending Glasgow School of Art (1958–63).

Byrne has received several Honorary Doctorates: In 1997, from the University of Paisley; in 2006, from the Robert Gordon University Gray's School of Art in Aberdeen; in 2011, from the University of Dundee; and in 2015, from the University of Stirling. In 2004, he was made an Associate of the Royal Scottish Academy.

Byrne married firstly to Alice Simpson on 1 April 1964, with whom he has two children in the late 1980s before separating. They officially divorced in 2014. He and the actress Tilda Swinton were in a relationship from around 1989 to 2003. They have two children, twins Honor and Xavier, born in 1997.[2] Byrne married theatrical lighting specialist Jeanine Davies in 2014. They live in Edinburgh.