Greetings!

A few odds & ends that might be interesting:

In case you missed it, there’s a great documentary about the life of the artist Gluck (1895-1978) on i-player

The story of Gluck – Britain’s cross-dressing high society painter of the 1930s – who staged ‘one-man shows’, had relationships with women and somehow got away with it.

Gluck: Who Did She Think He Was? – BBC iPlayer

In turn I would definitely recommend Diana Souhami’s biography

If you’re in ‘holiday spirit’ then Simon Morley’s La Belle France: British Artists Abroad, from Walter Sickert to David Hockney is published by Yale this week (and is very good!)

Simon Morley explores the influence of French culture on British artists during the modern period, and from his house in central France travels in the footsteps of artists including Francis Bacon, the Bloomsbury Group, Edward Burra, Leonora Carrington, David Hockney, Gwen John, Ben Nicholson, and Walter Sickert. For these British Francophiles, France’s culture and social milieu were the most powerful expressions of the spirit of modernity and profoundly inspirational, helping to free them from what they perceived as the straitlaced parochialism of their homeland.

And, if you’ve been with us either at The Beecroft or The Beaumont and are interested in our discussion of Patrick Heron’s paintings from the 1950s, there’s a small but fabulous exhibition at the

Hazlitt Holland-Hibbert Gallery (38 Bury Street, St James’s; website https://hh-h.com/exhibitions/44-patrick-heron-1950-54/ )

until 10th July that is definitely worth exploring if you’re passing by!

Patrick Heron (1920-1999) The Red Table [1950; Hazlitt Gallery]

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I hope you will be able to join us on

Saturday 30th May, 11.15am (for about an hour & a half)

at The Beecroft Art Gallery, Southend-on-Sea.

as we continue our research into the ‘long decade’ of 1950s Britain, from the end of World War II to Pop Art.

This month we’ll look at the ideas and paintings of post-war British Surrealists, in particular the art of Desmond Morris (the Scientist) and Ithell Colquhoun (the Occultist).

Left: Desmond Morris (1928-2026) The Last Serenade [1959; desmond-morris.com]

Right: Ithell Colquhoun (1906–1988) Autumnal Equinox [1949; Rediscovering Art by Women; artuk.org]

There’ll be plenty to see & discuss as always!

Tickets are £10 (cash) on the door and include coffee & a biscuit at The Jazz Centre afterwards.

Looking forward to seeing you!

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A new book that may be of interest in this context: Surrealism of Angst: Emmy Bridgwater by Silvano Levy (Paul Holberton Publishing)

Surrealism of Angst explores the extraordinary work of Emmy Bridgwater (1906–1999), the British Surrealist artist who has long been unjustly overlooked. Born in Birmingham, Bridgwater became associated with the Birmingham Surrealists in 1937 and joined the London Surrealist Group three years later. Her haunting imagery—sinister birds, savage cats, scenes of mutilation and violation—forms a visual language of disquiet and emotional intensity. This book reclaims Bridgwater’s place in the Surrealist canon, revealing a profound and often unsettling vision that is as innovative as it is affecting.

And Emmy Bridgwater’s art will be included in an exhibition “Surreal Solihull” at the Midlands Art Centre, Birmingham from 24 Oct 2026 to 10 Jan 2027.

Greetings!

I hope you will be able to join us

on Friday 22nd May, 11.30am (for about an hour)

at The Beaumont, Barchester Care, 15 Cannon Hill, Old Southgate, N14 7DJ

to further explore the life, times & art of Patrick Heron (1920-1999) at Eagle’s Nest in St Ives, where he engaged with abstraction in the pursuit of colour.

June Horizon [1957; The Hepworth Wakefield; c/o artuk.org]

There’ll be lots to look at and discuss – I hope you’ll be able to come along!

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The discussions are for everyone, whether residents or local community. Please note a £3 on-the-door request to cover the cost of coffee and biscuits. With all thanks to Barchester Health Care.

*

Notes:

Very interesting books:

***

I hope you will be able to join us on

Saturday 30th May, 11.15am (for about an hour & a half)

at The Beecroft Art Gallery, Southend-on-Sea.

as we continue our research into the ‘long decade’ of 1950s Britain, from the end of World War II to Pop Art.

This month we’ll look at the ideas and paintings of post-war British Surrealists, in particular the art of Desmond Morris (the Scientist) and Ithell Colquhoun (the Occultist).

Left: Desmond Morris (1928-2026) The Last Serenade [1959; desmond-morris.com]

Right: Ithell Colquhoun (1906–1988) Autumnal Equinox [1949; Rediscovering Art by Women; artuk.org]

There’ll be plenty to see & discuss as always!

Tickets are £10 (cash) on the door and include coffee & a biscuit at The Jazz Centre afterwards.

Looking forward to seeing you!

***

A new book that may be of interest in this context: Surrealism of Angst: Emmy Bridgwater by Silvano Levy (Paul Holberton Publishing)

Surrealism of Angst explores the extraordinary work of Emmy Bridgwater (1906–1999), the British Surrealist artist who has long been unjustly overlooked. Born in Birmingham, Bridgwater became associated with the Birmingham Surrealists in 1937 and joined the London Surrealist Group three years later. Her haunting imagery—sinister birds, savage cats, scenes of mutilation and violation—forms a visual language of disquiet and emotional intensity. This book reclaims Bridgwater’s place in the Surrealist canon, revealing a profound and often unsettling vision that is as innovative as it is affecting.

And Emmy Bridgwater’s art will be included in an exhibition “Surreal Solihull” at the Midlands Art Centre, Birmingham from 24 Oct 2026 to 10 Jan 2027.

Greetings!

I hope you will be able to join us

on Friday 17th April, 11.30am (for about an hour)

at The Beaumont, Barchester Care, 15 Cannon Hill, Old Southgate, N14 7DJ

to further explore the life, times & art of Peter Lanyon (1918-1964), one of the foremost artists of the post-war St Ives School who combined abstraction with landscape, portraying his native Cornwall in rich brushstrokes of colour and texture. Today we’ll look at his paintings for what I’ll call “ghostings” – the generative accumulations of events, history and myth that lie on and under the surface.

Landscape with Cup (Annunciation) [1946; private c/o Christie‘s; and note the essay on Sotheby‘s]

There’ll be lots to look at and discuss – I hope you’ll be able to come along!

*

The discussions are for everyone, whether residents or local community. Please note a £3 on-the-door request to cover the cost of coffee and biscuits. With all thanks to Barchester Health Care.

*

Notes:

Very interesting books:

***

I hope you will be able to join us on

Saturday 28th March, 11.15am (for about an hour & a half)

at The Beecroft Art Gallery, Southend-on-Sea.

as we continue our research into the ‘long decade’ of 1950s Britain, from the end of World War II to Pop Art.

This month we’ll focus on the post-war Neo-Romantic painters inspired by artists such as Paul Nash, John Piper and Graham Sutherland like John Craxton, Keith Vaughan and others who – remembering the work of Samuel Palmer and The Ancients a century before – sought an imaginative, visionary, even nostalgic art of landscape.

Greek Fisherman by John Craxton [1946; Pallant House Gallery]; A Path in the Woods by Graham Sutherland [1957; Norfolk Museums Service] Walking Figure by Keith Vaughan [1958; Jerwood Collection]

There’ll be plenty to see & discuss as always!

Tickets are £10 (cash) on the door and include coffee & a biscuit at The Jazz Centre afterwards.

Looking forward to seeing you!

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Notes:

There’s a very good short over-view essay on the Pallant House Gallery website on British Neo-Romanticism by Gerard Hastings here: https://pallant.org.uk/a-different-light-british-neo-romanticism/

Also, both online and at the John Swarbrooke Gallery, Fitzroy Square until 15th March, the exhibition A Paradise Regained: Neo-Romanticism in Britain; see https://privateviews.artlogic.net/2/12ac8f93e419afa9873e58/

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Greetings!

I hope you will be able to join us

on Friday 20th March, 11.30am (for about an hour)

at The Beaumont, Barchester Care, 15 Cannon Hill, Old Southgate, N14 7DJ

to explore the life, times & art of Peter Lanyon (1918-1964), one of the foremost artists of the post-war St Ives School who combined abstraction with landscape, portraying his native Cornwall in rich brushstrokes of colour and texture.

Silent Coast [1957; Manchester Art Gallery; artuk.org]

There’ll be lots to look at and discuss – I hope you’ll be able to come along!

*

The discussions are for everyone, whether residents or local community. Please note a £3 on-the-door request to cover the cost of coffee and biscuits. With all thanks to Barchester Health Care.

*

Notes:

Very interesting books:

***

Greetings!

A few odds & ends, links & resources that might be interesting…

The Gwen John: Strange Beauties exhibition has opened at the National Museum Cardiff – the Museum’s website has an interesting & insightful overview by Neil Lebeter: click here and there is a catalogue available (ISBN 9780300286571): “The first comprehensive survey in 40 years brings new scholarly attention and a feminist perspective to the Welsh painter with a singular vision of female interior life”. I would also recommend:

Indeed both Alicia Foster and Judith Mackrell appear in the BBC documentary Keeping the World Away – Finding Gwen John now on i-player here, and there’s a related essay by Natalie Grice, on the BBC News website here.

Keeping with the BBC, Susan Owen’s brilliant “Constable’s Year” is currently on Radio 4 / Sounds – here – but for a very limited time (18 days at time of writing!)

And for those of us intrigued by Gerald Lanscroon’s extraordinary Baroque mural at The Beaumont, an easel painting by the artist was auctioned at Bonhams this week:

Sadly there’s doesn’t seem to be anything known about the picture which is undated, and only desriptively titled: “Portrait of a child full-length, in a yellow costume with a red cloak, holding flowers and standing before a landscape”.

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I hope you will be able to join us on

Saturday 28th February, 11.15am (for about an hour & a half)

at The Beecroft Art Gallery, Southend-on-Sea.

as we continue our research into the ‘long decade’ of 1950s Britain, from the end of World War II to Pop Art.

This month we’ll focus on the Festival of Britain (1951) and the associated “Sixty Paintings for ’51” exhibition, as well as the Coronation (1953) and the “Britain of Tomorrow” exhibition (1956) to look at the diversity of artworks in subject and style during what was a period of radical cultural transition for art and society.

There’ll be plenty to see & discuss as always!

Tickets are £10 (cash) on the door and include coffee & a biscuit at The Jazz Centre afterwards.

Looking forward to seeing you!

*

Greetings!

I hope you will be able to join us

on Friday 20th February, 11.30am (for about an hour)

at The Beaumont, Barchester Care, 15 Cannon Hill, Old Southgate, N14 7DJ

to explore the life, times & art of Cliff Rowe (1904-1989) with particular reference to his post-World War II works and the influence of Soviet artist Alexander Deineka (1899-1969).

Left: Cliff Rowe’s “Textile Workers” [People’s History Museum; artuk.org]

Right: Alexander Deineka’s “Textile Workers” [1927; Russian Museum]

There’ll be lots to look at and discuss – I hope you’ll be able to come along!

*

The discussions are for everyone, whether residents or local community. Please note a £3 on-the-door request to cover the cost of coffee and biscuits. With all thanks to Barchester Health Care.

*

Notes:

Very interesting book:

Film on Ruskin Spear

There’s a fabulous short film / HENI Talk with Dr Tanya Harrod (author of “Humankind: Ruskin Spear
Class, culture and art in 20th-century Britain” published by Thames & Hudson, 2022) on the ArtUK site here.

And, currently at Tate Britain, the have a Tate Archive exhibition: “Artists International – The First Decade”; see: https://www.tate.org.uk/visit/tate-britain/display/artists-international along with Andy Friend’s new book “Comrades in Art: Artists Against Fascism 1933-1943”

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