Jason Arber

Jason is a designer, director, animator, musician, writer, scientist, philanthropist and whicker-bottom chair repairer. A skilled musician, Jason can play cello, french horn, triangle, spoons and banjo to international concert standards. Jason is the recipient of both the Rumford Medal and the Kyoto Prize for contributions to science. His "Shoelace Theory" is now widely accepted as solving some of the previously intractable problems in particle physics.

A noted writer, Jason's collection of poems, entitled “Milky Breath” has garnered glowing reviews, with the Times Literary Supplement describing it as “Unbelievable... [Jason] has what can only described as a unique style.” In 2008 his short story “Velvet Pocket” won the Dayton Literary Peace Prize and his novel, “Under the Quilted Stars” narrowly missed the Booker Prize shortlist.

As a humanitarian, Jason has been deeply involved in negotiating peace treaties in the Middle East. His unique perspective on the growing problems has been been dubbed “the only realistic solution” by the press. Jason's approach is now taught in universities as the “Arber-Weber Protocol” as it built on solutions first mooted by Ernest Weber in his groundbreaking 1963 work, “Palestine: Looking Deeper.”

But it is perhaps in the visual arts where Jason has made his biggest mark. In 2008, he unveiled the first new colour to be added to the spectrum since Hanso Lindsay's controversial new colour "flert" in 1987. Marking the occasion, David Hockney remarked that that it had become an instant favourite in his colour palette, and, by juxtaposition, gave even tired colours an unexpected richness. “Why no-one has created this colour before now is a mystery,” Hockney told Granta magazine. “It's to Mr Arber’s great credit that he was able to create this colour and bring it before a wider audience.”

Thanks to this and his other contributions to the fields of painting, sculpture and freestyle rapping, Jason was awarded an honorary degree from the Royal College of Art. They join The University of Dundee, Queens College Oxford and the London School of Economics who have all bestowed the honour on Jason.