St. Ives : the art and the artist

For 25 years the small town of St Ives was one of the leading places in the world for the production of avant-garde art.

The community there spanned three generations and included such international figures as Naum Gabo, Barbara Hepworth and Ben Nicholson, as well as a number of the foremost artists in post-war Britain, such as Peter Lanyon, Patrick Heron, Terry Frost and Roger Hilton.

They found themselves contributing to the international search for art in the post-war world and they established a modernist practice that had influence late into the last century. Although place itself is clearly important in the works of these artists, and the influence of the landscape itself can't be over-stated, recent research has repositioned the colony as a more outward-looking group both in terms of the international influence they projected out, and the influences they absorbed. Lifelong St Ives scholar Chris Stephens brings together these two strands in a study that encompasses both a historical account of the artists, activities and art made as part of the phenomenon, and is also a critical consideration the construction of the St Ives narrative itself.

He examines the community from its early inception in the 1930s, with Nicolson, Hepworth and Gabo maintaining modernist debate and practice during the war; to the 1960s where he considers how the rise of Pop and other movements challenged the St Ives artists to explore new visual languages. The story of St Ives and the artists who lived and worked there has captured the imagination of art lovers since it began.

This book is the definitive story of this remarkable phenomenon, the product of decades of research by leading authority Chris Stephens, and will illuminate the period for dedicated fans and new readers alike.