Hans Schwarz was a British painter and sculptor of Austrian origin. Born in Vienna in 1922, Schwarz began his artistic training at the Vienna Gewerbeschule in 1937 but was forced to leave Austria a year later due to the Nazi-occupation of his native country. In 1939, at the age of 16, Schwarz relocated to Birmingham, England where he initially sought work as a labourer. In 1940, Schwarz was interned for a year on the Isle of Man. He later trained at the Birmingham School of Arts and Crafts between the years 1941 – 1943 before working in a commercial art studio, continuing to take evening classes at the College to further his artistic education.

Following the Second World War, Schwarz worked as a freelance illustrator between the years 1945 – 1964 when, after several years spent focusing on commercial design projects, he decided to dedicate his time exclusively to painting and sculpting. The artist worked in several different media such as oil, acrylic and even household paints on occasion, before discovering watercolour late in to his career. Schwarz lived and worked in Greenwich, where he produced his distinctive portraits and sculptures throughout much of his career, though the environment surrounding his holiday cottage in Somerset provided great inspiration for the artist’s vibrant landscape paintings. He was a member of both the Royal Society of British Artists and of Portrait Painters, the Royal Watercolour Society and several other London based cultural groups. Schwarz participated in several group exhibitions, receiving many prizes and accolades throughout his career including the Hunting Group Prize for watercolour in 1981. In 1982 Schwarz held his first solo exhibition at the Thackeray Gallery, London, the first of many one-man exhibitions to be held in the 1980s and early 1990s. Throughout his professional artistic career, Schwarz wrote several books on painting. The artist died in 2003. His work remains in the collection of the National Portrait Gallery and the National Maritime Museum in London.