{{Use British English, date=July 2015 Ravilious1925

The Great Bardfield Artists were a community of artists who lived in

Great Bardfield Great Bardfield is a large village in the Braintree district of Essex, England. It is located approximately northwest of the town of Braintree, and approximately southeast of Saffron Walden. The village came to national attention during the ...

, a village in north west

Essex Essex () is a county in the East of England. One of the home counties, it borders Suffolk and Cambridgeshire to the north, the North Sea to the east, Hertfordshire to the west, Kent across the estuary of the River Thames to the south, and G ...

, England, during the middle years of the 20th century. The principal artists who lived there between 1930 and 1970 were

John Aldridge John William Aldridge (born 18 September 1958) is a former football player and manager. He was a prolific, record-breaking striker best known for his time with English club Liverpool Liverpool is a city and metropolitan borough in M ...

RA,

Edward Bawden Edward Bawden, (10 March 1903 – 21 November 1989) was an English painter, illustrator and graphic artist, known for his prints, book covers, posters, and garden metalwork furniture. Bawden taught at the Royal College of Art, where he had be ...

George Chapman George Chapman (Hitchin, Hertfordshire, – London, 12 May 1634) was an English dramatist, translator and poet. He was a classical scholar whose work shows the influence of Stoicism. Chapman has been speculated to be the Rival Poet of Shak ...

, Stanley Clifford-Smith,

Audrey Cruddas Audrey Cruddas (1912–1979) was an English costume and scene designer, painter and potter. Biography Born in Johannesburg, South Africa, Cruddas moved to England with her parents when she was an infant. After leaving school she studied art at ...

Walter Hoyle Walter Hoyle (1922–2000) was an English artist, known for his prints, watercolours and illustration. He was a central figure in the Great Bardfield group of artists and a close associate of Edward Bawden. He taught at the Central School, Londo ...

Eric Ravilious Eric William Ravilious (22 July 1903 – 2 September 1942) was a British painter, designer, book illustrator and wood-engraver. He grew up in Sussex, and is particularly known for his watercolours of the South Downs and other English landsca ...

Sheila Robinson Sheila Robinson may refer to: * Sheila Radley, a pseudonym of Sheila Robinson, British mystery novelist * Sheila Robinson (artist), a British artist * Sheila Robinson (publisher), a businesswoman and magazine founder {{Disambiguation} ...

Michael Rothenstein William Michael Rothenstein (19 March 1908 – 6 July 1993) was a British printmaker, painter and art teacher. Early life Born in Hampstead, London, on 19 March 1908, he was the youngest of four children born to the celebrated artist, Sir W ...

Kenneth Rowntree Kenneth Rowntree (14 March 1915 – 21 February 1997) was a British artist. Career and life Kenneth Rowntree was born in Scarborough, the son of Howard Doncaster Rowntree (1879-1974). He was educated at Bootham School, York. He studied at th ...

and

Marianne Straub Marianne Straub OBE (23 September 1909 – 8 November 1994) was one of the leading commercial designers of textiles in Britain in the period from the 1940s to 1960s. She said her overriding aim was: "to design things which people could afford. .. ...

. Other artists associated with the group include

Duffy Ayers Betty Mona Desmond Ayers (née FitzGerald; 19 September 1915 – 10 November 2017), known as Duffy Ayers, was an English portrait painter. She was known for most of her life by the nickname "Duffy". Born in Great Missenden, Buckinghamshire, one o ...

, John Bolam, Bernard Cheese,

Tirzah Garwood Eileen Lucy "Tirzah" Garwood (11 April 1908 – 27 March 1951) was a British artist and engraver, a member of the Great Bardfield Artists. The artist Eric Ravilious was her husband from 1930 until his death in 1942. Early life Garwood was bo ...

Joan Glass Elizabeth Joan Glass (1915–2000), was an English textile designer and painter. Biography Youth Glass was born in Orpington, Kent. She was the oldest of three daughters born to John Pomeroy Glass and Edith Mary Muirhead. Her father, was a se ...

, David Low and Laurence Scarfe. Great Bardfield Artists were diverse in style but shared a love for

figurative art Figurative art, sometimes written as figurativism, describes artwork (particularly paintings and sculptures) that is clearly derived from real object sources and so is, by definition, representational. The term is often in contrast to abstract a ...

, making the group distinct from the better known

St Ives School The St Ives School refers to a group of artists living and working in the Cornish town of St Ives.St Ives, Cornwall St Ives ( kw, Porth Ia, meaning "Ia of Cornwall, St Ia's cove") is a seaside town, civil parish and port in Cornwall, England. The town lies north of Penzance and west of Camborne on the coast of the Celtic Sea. In former times it was commerci ...

, who, after the war, were chiefly dominated by abstractionists. During the 1950s the Great Bardfield Artists organised a series of large 'open house' exhibitions which attracted national and international press attention. Positive reviews and the novelty of viewing modernist art works in the artists' own homes led to thousands visiting the remote village during the summer exhibitions of 1954, 1955 and 1958. As well as these large shows the Great Bardfield Artists held exhibitions of their work in Cambridge (1956) and Bristol (1959). The artists also organised a multi-city tour of England and Ireland during 1957 and 1958. The early 1960s saw the majority of the Great Bardfield artists leave the village.

Legacy

In 1985, the

Fry Art Gallery The Fry Art Gallery is an art gallery in Saffron Walden, Essex. Recognised as an Accredited Museum by Arts Council England, it displays work by artists of national significance who lived or worked in North West Essex during the twentieth cent ...

was established in

Saffron Walden Saffron Walden is a market town in the Uttlesford district of Essex, England, north of Bishop's Stortford, south of Cambridge and north of London. It retains a rural appearance and some buildings of the medieval period. The population was 15, ...

with the expressed aim of highlighting the paintings, prints, wallpapers, books, fabrics and ceramics made by the Great Bardfield art community between 1930 and 1970. Many of the artists have had exhibitions at the Fry Art Gallery and elsewhere.

References

Colin MacInnes Colin MacInnes (20 August 1914 – 22 April 1976) was an English novelist and journalist. Early life MacInnes was born in London, the son of singer James Campbell McInnes and novelist Angela Mackail, who was the granddaughter of the Pre-Rap ...

, ‘Introduction’, ''Great Bardfield Artists'', W. S. Cowell, Ipswich, c.1957 * Martin Salisbury, ''Artists at the Fry: Art and Design in the North West Essex Collection'', Ruskin Press, Cambridge, 2003 * W. J. Strachan, ‘The Artists of Great Bardfield’, ''Studio'', March 1958

External links

Fry Art Gallery
English artists British artist groups and collectives