LESLIE Thornton – a poor Skipton lad who went from Bevin Boy to international artist – has died at the age of 90.

He was born in 1925 to Evelyn Thornton, who was a cotton twister at Dewhurst's Mill in Skipton, but was raised from the age of two by his grandmother, Eliza Thornton.

He attended Brougham Street School in Skipton, where he surprised teachers with his drawing skills.

He left school aged 14 and started work as an apprentice at GH Mason in Skipton – an upmarket painting and decorating company. As part of his apprenticeship, he attended Keighley Art School on a Saturday morning and one evening, but this changed to nightly attendance as his interest in taking art deepened.

Early influences on Leslie’s future artwork included an oil painting by his great grandfather and lettering used by the Craven Herald, which fascinated him. He spent much time copying it.

Leslie won a County Art Major Scholarship to study art at Leeds Art School in 1942. However, in 1943, he was conscripted through National Service to work in the Yorkshire coal mines until 1946 as a Bevin Boy and so his training at Leeds was postponed.

He worked on the coal face, assisting trained miners, but his service came to an end two years later when he collapsed.

Leslie met his future wife, Constance Helen Billows, at a cricket club dance in Skipton Town Hall. They married on September 4, 1950, and went on to have two children – Lisa Jane and David Robert. Sadly, Connie died in November 2013.

After his National Service, Leslie resumed his scholarship at Leeds School of Art and subsequently won a place at the Royal College of Art (RCA). There he was trained in the conventional art forms of the time using wood, concrete and plaster.

He found himself at war with traditional sculpture and, on leaving the RCA in 1951, struck out in a new field using metal. He took a two-week course in the art of welding in 1953 and then found a disused stable in Tooting, London, for his studio.

He used British Oxygen equipment and a lightweight blowpipe to create intricately designed figures and forms. His work was 'revolutionary' in the art world of the time and was snapped up by collectors in the USA and Canada.

All had to change in the 1960s, as having had two children required a predictable salary. He became a senior lecturer at the Sunderland Polytechnic in 1963 and was then principal lecturer and head of the sculpture department at the North Staffordshire Polytechnic from 1970 to 1989.

He continued to produce some sculpture and became attracted to volume and mass using geometry and colour.

After retiring to Yorkshire, Leslie produced many paintings that remain with his children along with the family collection of his unique sculptures from the 1950s to the 1970s.

He is survived by his two children and two grandchildren, Stephanie and James.