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In 1947, Leonard Daniels, who has died aged 89, became principal of Camberwell School of Art and Crafts. He was to remain for more than quarter of a century, from those optimistic post war times, when ex-service men were getting grants, the Inner London Education Authority was funding artists and craftsmen as teachers, and studios and classrooms were overflowing.

Daniels's predecessor, William Johnston, had in 1945 invited Edward Ardizzone and John Minton to teach illustration, and William Coldstream, Victor Pasmore, Claude Rogers and Lawerence Gowing - members of the Euston Road school - to teach painting. It provided a momentum at Camberwell's painting school which was to be sustained for many years.

Leonard reinforced the fine art staff by appointing Martin Bloch as visiting painter and Karel Vogel as head of sculpture. He steered through the evolution of the design department into separate illustration, textiles and ceramic departments while conservation of drawings and documents was separated from the school of printing, the third traditional component of Camberwell. Thus did the school become less industrially and technically orientated, and more aligned with fine art.

Born in London, Daniels was educated at Holloway school, Regent Street Polytechnic and the Royal College of Art, where he won the annual portrait prize in 1932. Robust, determined, civilised, a little solitary, he used to walk from the RCA in South Kensington to Battersea Park to run in the evenings - he was a medal winning sprinter.

As a painter, he exhibited in the 1930s at Goupil galleries and at the Redfern. He taught at several schools, including Clayesmore in Dorset and Taunton's in Southampton, before moving to Southampton and Portsmouth colleges of art. In 1934, he married Frances Rapaport, a fellow student.

A fencing accident precluded him from wartime military service and he spent a happy four years as head of painting at Leeds College of Art. A painting he did for the War Artists Advisory Council is now in the Imperial War Museum,

Daniels saw further ahead than most. He was a shrewd judge of character, who always appreciated the worth of his staff. With students, he was a little remote - "decent" and "sensible" were the language of his praise. Under his leadership, the school was characterised by confidence and mutual respect.

His later Camberwell years were shadowed by the illness and death of his wife in 1967. On retirement in 1974, he remained in London, where he was a churchwarden at Christ Church, Lancaster Gate, and was surprised to find himself sharing his love of painting with an informal group of elderly students at Kingston Adult Education Institute.

Eventually, he moved to Midhurst, Sussex, painting as he always had, portraits especially, including one of his friend Sir Thomas Armstrong, and a self-portrait. He stubbornly resisted exhibiting but had recently consented to a joint showing of his own and his wife's work at Winchester Cathedral. He is survived by his daughter and grandchildren.

Chris Pemberton

Leonard Daniels, painter, born November 28, 1909; died February 24, 1998.

The Guardian 25-ii-98

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