John Charles Wood Heath was born in England in 1915 and attended college at the Royal College of Art London, where he won the British Institute Empire Scholarship in Engraving in 1938 and the Drawing Prize in 1939. After suffering an injury during WWII, Heath moved with his family to South Africa, where he served as head of the art school at Port Elizabeth Technical College from 1947-1952. During this time, he did freelance cartooning for The Saturday Post. After becoming Professor in the Fine Arts Department at University of Natal in 1953, he won first prize in the "Art and Religion" art competition organized by Gallery 101 in Johannesburg. After Heath died in 1969, the University of Natal renamed their gallery the Jack Heath Gallery and mounted a retrospective exhibition of his work.
- Internet archive of Jack Heath’s contributions to the art world, both before and after his death
- The Heaths were a family of artists, as you can see on Jinny Heath’s tumblr page, which features work from the whole family, including never before exhibited works from Jack Heath