Art, Books & Culture Research Group at The Beecroft, Saturday 28th March 2026 – The Last of the Neo-Romantics

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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Art & Coffee at The Beaumont, Friday 20th March 2026: To St Ives with Peter Lanyon

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!

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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.

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Notes:

Very interesting books:

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