Earliest art
The earliest English art – also Europe's earliest and northernmost cave art – is located at Creswell Crags in Creswell, Derbyshire, Derbyshire, estimated at between 13,000 and 15,000 years old. In 2003, more than 80 engravings and bas-reliefs, depicting deer, bison, horses, and what may be birds or List of avian humanoids, bird-headed people were found there. The famous, large ritual landscape of Stonehenge dates from the Neolithic period; around 2600 BC. From around 2150 BC, the Beaker people learned how to make bronze, and used both tin and gold. They became skilled in Refining (metallurgy), metal refining and their works of art, placed in graves or sacrificial pits have survived. In the Iron Age, a new art style arrived as Celt, Celtic culture and spread across the British isles. Though metalwork, especially gold ornaments, was still important, stone and most likely wood were also used. This style continued into the Roman Britain, Roman period, beginning in the 1st century BC, and found a renaissance in the Mediæval Britain, Medieval period. The arrival of the Romans brought the Classicism, Classical style of which many monuments have survived, especially Funerary art, funerary monuments, statues and busts. They also brought Roman glass, glasswork and Roman mosaic, mosaics. In the 4th century, a new element was introduced as the first Christian art was made in Britain. Several mosaics with Christian symbols and pictures have been preserved. England boasts some remarkable prehistoric hill figures; a famous example is the Uffington White Horse in Oxfordshire, which "for more than 3,000 years ... has been jealously guarded as a masterpiece of Minimalism, minimalist art."Earliest art: gallery
Medieval art
After End of Roman rule in Britain, Roman rule, Anglo-Saxon art brought the incorporation of Germanic traditions, as may be seen in the metalwork of Sutton Hoo. Anglo-Saxon art, Anglo-Saxon sculpture was outstanding for its time, at least in the small works in ivory or bone which are almost all that survive. Especially in Northumbria, the Insular art style shared across the British Isles produced the finest work being produced in Europe, until the Viking raids and invasions largely suppressed the movement; the Book of Lindisfarne is one example certainly produced in Northumbria. Anglo-Saxon art developed a very sophisticated variation on contemporary Continental styles, seen especially in metalwork and illuminated manuscripts such as the Benedictional of St. Æthelwold. None of the large-scale Anglo-Saxon paintings and sculptures that we know existed have survived. By the first half of the 11th century, English art benefited from lavish patronage by a wealthy Anglo-Saxon elite, who valued above all works in precious metals. but the Norman Conquest in 1066 brought a sudden halt to this art boom, and instead works were melted down or removed to Normandy. The so-called Bayeux Tapestry - the large, English-made, Embroidery, embroidered cloth depicting events leading up to the Norman conquest - dates to the late 11th century. Some decades after the Norman conquest, manuscript painting in England was soon again among the best of any in Europe; in Romanesque art, Romanesque works such as the Winchester Bible and the St. Albans Psalter, and then in early Gothic ones like the Tickhill Psalter. The best-known English illuminator of the period is Matthew Paris (c. 1200–1259). Some of the rare surviving examples of English medieval panel paintings, such as the Westminster Retable and Wilton Diptych, are of the highest quality. From the late 14th century to the early 16th century, England had a considerable industry in Nottingham alabaster reliefs for mid-market altarpieces and small statues, which were exported across Northern Europe. Another art form introduced through the church was stained glass, which was also adopted for secular uses.Medieval art: gallery
16th and 17th centuries
Nicholas Hilliard (artist), Nicholas Hilliard (c. 1547–7 January 1619) – "the first native-born genius of English painting" – began a strong English tradition in the portrait miniature. The tradition was continued by Hilliard's pupil Isaac Oliver (c. 1565–bur. 2 October 1617), whose French Huguenots, Huguenot parents had escaped to England in the artist's childhood. Other notable English artists across the period include: Nathaniel Bacon (painter), Nathaniel Bacon (1585–1627); John Bettes the Elder (active c. 1531–1570) and John Bettes the Younger (died 1616); George Gower (c.1540–1596), William Larkin (painter), William Larkin (early 1580s–1619), and Robert Peake the Elder (c. 1551–1619). The artists of the Tudor court and their successors until the early 18th century included a number of influential imported talents: Hans Holbein the Younger, Anthony van Dyck, Peter Paul Rubens, Orazio Gentileschi and his daughter Artemisia Gentileschi, Artemisia, Sir Peter Lely (a naturalised English subject from 1662), and Sir Godfrey Kneller (a naturalised English subject by the time of his 1691 knighthood). The 17th century saw a number of significant English painters of full-size portraits, most notably William Dobson 1611 (bapt. 1611–bur. 1646); others include Cornelius Johnson (artist), Cornelius Johnson (bapt. 1593–bur. 1661) and Robert Walker (painter), Robert Walker (1599–1658). Samuel Cooper (painter), Samuel Cooper (1609–1672) was an accomplished miniaturist in Hilliard's tradition, as was his brother Alexander Cooper (1609–1660), and their uncle, John Hoskins (painter), John Hoskins (1589/1590–1664). Other notable portraitists of the period include: Thomas Flatman (1635–1688), Richard Gibson (painter), Richard Gibson (1615–1690), the dissolute John Greenhill (c. 1644–1676), John Riley (painter), John Riley (1646–1691), and John Michael Wright (1617–1694). Francis Barlow (artist), Francis Barlow (c. 1626–1704) is known as "the father of British sporting painting"; he was England's first Animal painter, wildlife painter, beginning a tradition that reached a high-point a century later, in the work of George Stubbs (1724–1806). English women began painting professionally in the 17th century; notable examples include Joan Carlile (c. 1606–79), and Mary Beale (née Cradock; 1633–1699). In the first half of the 17th century the English nobility became important collectors of European art, led by Charles I of England, King Charles I and Thomas Howard, 21st Earl of Arundel. By the end of the 17th century, the Grand Tour – a trip of Europe giving exposure to the cultural legacy of classical antiquity and the Renaissance – was ''de rigueur'' for wealthy young Englishmen.16th and 17th centuries: gallery
18th and 19th centuries
In the 18th century, English painting's distinct style and tradition continued to concentrate frequently on portraiture, but interest in landscapes increased, and a new focus was placed on history painting, which was regarded as the highest of the hierarchy of genres, and is exemplified in the extraordinary work of Sir James Thornhill (1675/1676–1734). History painter Robert Streater (1621–1679) was highly thought of in his time. William Hogarth (1697–1764) reflected the burgeoning English Social class in the United Kingdom, middle-class temperament — English in habits, disposition, and temperament, as well as by birth. His satire, satirical works, full of black humour, point out to contemporary society the deformities, weaknesses and vices of 18th-century London, London life. Hogarth's influence can be found in the distinctively English satirical tradition continued by James Gillray (1756–1815), and George Cruikshank (1792–1878). One of the genres in which Hogarth worked was the conversation piece, a form in which certain of his contemporaries also excelled: Joseph Highmore (1692–1780), Francis Hayman (1708–1776), and Arthur Devis (1712–1787), Arthur Devis (1712–1787). Portraits were in England, as in Europe, the easiest and most profitable way for an artist to make a living, and the English tradition continued to show the relaxed elegance of the portrait-style traceable to Van Dyck. The leading portraitists are: Thomas Gainsborough (1727–1788); Sir Joshua Reynolds (1723–1792), founder of the Royal Academy of Arts; George Romney (painter), George Romney (1734–1802); Lemuel Francis Abbott, Lemuel "Francis" Abbott (1760/61–1802); Richard Westall (1765–1836); Sir Thomas Lawrence (painter), Thomas Lawrence (1769–1830); and Thomas Phillips (1770–1845). Also of note are Jonathan Richardson (1667–1745) and his pupil (and defiant son-in-law) Thomas Hudson (painter), Thomas Hudson (1701–1779). Joseph Wright of Derby (1734–1797) was well known for his candlelight pictures; George Stubbs (1724–1806) and, later, Edwin Henry Landseer (1802–1873) for their Animal painter, animal paintings. By the end of the century, the English swagger portrait was much admired abroad. London's William Blake (1757–1827) produced a diverse and visionary body of work defying straightforward classification; critic Jonathan Jones (journalist), Jonathan Jones regards him as "far and away the greatest artist Britain has ever produced". Blake's artist friends included Neoclassicism, neoclassicist John Flaxman (1755–1826), and Thomas Stothard (1755–1834) with whom Blake quarrelled. In the popular imagination English landscape painting from the 18th century onwards typifies English art, inspired largely from the love of the pastoral and mirroring as it does the development of larger country houses set in a pastoral rural landscape. Two English Romanticism, Romantics are largely responsible for raising the status of landscape painting worldwide: John Constable (1776–1837) and J. M. W. Turner (1775–1851), who is credited with elevating landscape painting to an eminence rivalling history painting. Other notable 18th and 19th century landscape painters include: George Arnald (1763–1841); John Linnell (painter), John Linnell (1792–1882), a rival to Constable in his time; George Morland (1763–1804), who developed on Francis Barlow (artist), Francis Barlow's tradition of Animal painter, animal and rustic painting; Samuel Palmer (1805–1881); Paul Sandby (1731–1809), who is recognised as the father of English watercolour painting; and subsequent watercolourists John Robert Cozens (1752–1797), Turner's friend Thomas Girtin (1775–1802), and Thomas Heaphy (1775–1835). The early 19th century saw the emergence of the Norwich School (art movement), Norwich school of painters, the first provincial art movement outside of London. Short-lived owing to sparse patronage and internal dissent, its prominent members were "founding father" John Crome (1768–1821), John Sell Cotman (1782–1842), James Stark (painter), James Stark (1794–1859), and Joseph Stannard (1797–1830). The Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood movement, established in the 1840s, dominated English art in the second half of the 19th century. Its members — William Holman Hunt (1827–1910), Dante Gabriel Rossetti (1828–1882), John Everett Millais (1828–1896) and others — concentrated on religious, literary, and genre works executed in a colorful and minutely detailed, almost photographic style. Ford Madox Brown (1821–1893) shared the Pre-Raphaelites' principles. Leading English art critic John Ruskin (1819–1900) was hugely influential in the latter half of the 19th century; from the 1850s he championed the Pre-Raphaelites, who were influenced by his ideas. William Morris (1834–1896), founder of the Arts and Crafts Movement, emphasised the value of traditional Handicraft#The Arts and Crafts movement in the West, craft skills which seemed to be in decline in the mass Second Industrial Revolution, industrial age. His designs, like the work of the Pre-Raphaelite painters with whom he was associated, referred frequently to Medieval art, medieval Motif (folkloristics), motifs. English narrative painter William Powell Frith (1819–1909) has been described as the "greatest British painter of the social scene since Hogarth", and painter and sculptor George Frederic Watts (1817–1904) became famous for his Symbolism (arts), symbolist work. The Courage, gallant spirit of 19th century English War artist, military art helped shape Victorian era, Victorian England's self-image. Notable English military artists include: John Edward Chapman 'Chester' Mathews (1843–1927); Elizabeth Thompson, Lady Butler (1846–1933); Frank Dadd (1851–1929); Edward Matthew Hale (1852–1924); Charles Edwin Fripp (1854–1906); Richard Caton Woodville, Jr. (1856–1927); Harry Payne (artist), Harry Payne (1858–1927); George Delville Rowlandson (1861–1930); and Edgar Alfred Holloway (1870–1941). Thomas Davidson (painter), Thomas Davidson (1842–1919), who specialised in historical naval scenes, incorporated remarkable reproductions of Horatio Nelson, 1st Viscount Nelson, Nelson-related works by George Arnald, Arnald, Richard Westall, Westall and Lemuel Francis Abbott, Abbott in ''England's Pride and Glory'' (1894). To the end of the 19th century, the art of Aubrey Beardsley (1872–1898) contributed to the development of Art Nouveau, and suggested, among other things, an interest in the visual art of Japan.18th and 19th centuries: gallery
20th century
Impressionism found a focus in the New English Art Club, founded in 1886. Notable members included Walter Sickert (1860–1942) and Philip Wilson Steer (1860–1942), two English painters with coterminous lives who became influential in the 20th century. Sickert went on to the Post-Impressionism, post-impressionist Camden Town Group, active 1911–1913, and was prominent in the transition to Modernism. Steer's sea and landscape paintings made him a leading Impressionist, but later work displays a more traditional English style, influenced by both Constable and Turner. Paul Nash (artist), Paul Nash (1889–1946) played a key role in the development of Modernism in English art. He was among the most important landscape artists of the first half of the twentieth century, and the artworks he produced during World War I are among the most iconic World War I in popular culture, images of the conflict. Nash attended the Slade School of Fine Art, Slade School of Art, where the remarkable generation of artists who studied under the influential Henry Tonks (1862–1937) included, too, Harold Gilman (1876–1919), Spencer Gore (artist), Spencer Gore (1878–1914), David Bomberg (1890–1957), Stanley Spencer (1891–1959), Mark Gertler (artist), Mark Gertler (1891–1939), and Roger Hilton (1911–1975). Modernism's most controversial English talent was writer and painter Wyndham Lewis (1882–1957). He co-founded the Vorticism, Vorticist movement in art, and after becoming better known for his writing than his painting in the 1920s and early 1930s he returned to more concentrated work on visual art, with paintings from the 1930s and 1940s constituting some of his best-known work. Walter Sickert called Wyndham Lewis: "the greatest portraitist of this or any other time". Modernist sculpture was exemplified by English artists Henry Moore (1898–1986), well known for his carved marble and larger-scale Abstract art, abstract cast bronze sculptures, and Barbara Hepworth (1903–1975), who was a leading figure in the colony of artists who resided in St Ives, Cornwall during World War II. Lancashire, Lancastrian L. S. Lowry (1887–1976) became famous for his scenes of life in the industrial districts of North West England in the mid-20th century. He developed a distinctive style of painting and is best known for his urban landscapes peopled with human figures often referred to as "matchstick men". Notable English artists of the mid-20th century and after include: Graham Sutherland (1903–1980); Carel Weight (1908–1997); Ruskin Spear (1911–1990); pop art pioneers Richard Hamilton (artist), Richard Hamilton (1922–2011), Peter Blake (artist), Peter Blake (b. 1932), and David Hockney (b. 1937); and op art exemplar Bridget Riley (b. 1931). Following the development of Postmodernism, English art became in some respect synonymous toward the end of the 20th century with the Turner Prize; the prize, established in 1984 and named with ostensibly credible intentions after J. M. W. Turner, earned for latterday English art a reputation arguably to its detriment. Prize exhibits have included The Physical Impossibility of Death in the Mind of Someone Living, a shark in formaldehyde and My Bed, a dishevelled bed. Critic Matthew Collings observes that: "Turner Prize art is based on a formula where something looks startling at first and then turns out to be expressing some kind of banal idea, which somebody will be sure to tell you about. The ideas are never important or even really ideas, more notions, like the notions in advertising. Nobody pursues them anyway, because there's nothing there to pursue." While the Turner Prize establishment satisfied itself with weak Conceptual art, conceptual homages to authentic Iconoclasm, iconoclasts like Marcel Duchamp, Duchamp and Piero Manzoni, Manzoni, it spurned original talents such as Beryl Cook (1926–2008). The award ceremony has since 2000 attracted annual Demonstration (protest), demonstrations by the "Stuckism, Stuckists", a group calling for a return to figurative art and Aesthetics, aesthetic authenticity (philosophy), authenticity. Observing wryly that "the only artist who wouldn't be in danger of winning the Turner Prize is Turner", the Stuckists staged in 2000 a "Real Turner Prize 2000" exhibition, promising (by contrast) "no rubbish".20th century: gallery
21st century
The sculptor Antony Gormley (b. 1950) expressed doubts a decade after winning the Turner Prize about his "usefulness to the human race", and work including ''Another Place (sculpture), Another Place'' (2005) and ''Event Horizon (sculpture), Event Horizon'' (2012) has achieved both acclaim and popularity. The pseudo-subversive urban art of Banksy, has been much discussed in the media. A highly visible and much praised work of public art, seen for a brief period in 2014 was ''Blood Swept Lands and Seas of Red'', a collaboration between artist Paul Cummins (b. 1977) and theatre designer Tom Piper. The Installation art, installation at the Tower of London between July and November 2014 commemorated the centenary of the outbreak of World War I; it consisted of 888,246 ceramic red Papaver rhoeas, poppies, each intended to represent one British or Colonial serviceman killed in the War. Leading contemporary printmakers include Norman Ackroyd and Richard Spare.English art on display
* British Museum * Delaware Art Museum * National Gallery, London, National Gallery * National Portrait Gallery, London, National Portrait Gallery * Tate Britain * Victoria and Albert Museum * Walker Art Gallery * Yale Center for British ArtSee also
* Art of the United Kingdom * Arts Council England * British art * English underground * Insular art * List of British painters * Museums in England * Neo-romanticism * Royal CollectionFurther reading
*David Bindman (ed.), ''The Thames and Hudson Encyclopaedia of British Art'' (London, 1985) *Joseph Burke, ''English Art, 1714–1800'' (Oxford, 1976) *William Gaunt (art historian), William Gaunt, ''A Concise History of English Painting'' (London, 1978) *William Gaunt, ''The Great Century of British Painting: Hogarth to Turner'' (London, 1971)References
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