Michael Ayrton was born in London, the son of the poet and critic, Gerald Gould and MP, Barbara Ayrton Gould. He studied art in London before visiting Paris in 1938 with the artist John Minton, where they studied with the French neo-romanticist Eugene Berman (1899-1972). A true polymath, Ayrton worked in painting, sculpture, theatre design, art criticism, film-making and radio broadcasting. He had an enduring passion for the Greek myth of Daedalus and Icarus, which he explored through the medium of sculpture. In 1986 he built a large-scale maze in New York State that imitated the Minotaur’s Labyrinth, the mythical creation of Daedalus. His work is represented in major collections particularly in Britain, the United States and Canada.
