 Throughout his career, Surrey worked in watercolours, oils, ink, charcoal as well as lithography, and his oeuvre also includes Canadian landscapes.Philip Henry Howard Surrey was born on October 8, 1910, in Calgary, Alberta, the son of adventurer Harry Philip Surrey and Kate de Guerin, a relative of portraitist Richard Crosse, who taught him to read, write and sketch.As a young child Surrey lived at Raffles Hotel in Singapore and the Grand Hotel in Calcutta, and attended St Paul's School in Darjeeling.