St. Ives’ First Art Colony

Course Introduction

The First Art Colony in St. Ives 1890 – 1949

In this course we will look at the first colony of artists who came to St. Ives in the late 19th century. It was an international melting pot with painters coming from as far as America, Australia, New Zealand and Sweden to capture the ever changing light. The predominant subject was the sea and particularly nocturnes and twilight pictures which artists such as Julius Olsson and Louis Grier perfected. But there were also figure painters including William H. Titcomb and Adrian Stokes.

St. Ives also attracted many women artists, some were marine painters such as Mary McCrossan and some specialised in depicting children such as Marianne Stokes and Helene Schjerfbeck. The founding of the St. Ives Society of Artists in 1927 widened the range of artists who came to St. Ives.

We look at some of the many artists who exhibited at the Society from 1927 to 1949. We end with the continuation of the figurative tradition being taught at the St. Ives School of Painting from 1938 – 1949.

Artists covered in this course include:

A list of artists included in each lecture and a Further Reading list will be sent via email with the links to each lecture for you to watch on YouTube once you have paid.

This course consists of 7 x 2 hour lectures.

Course Dates

The Lectures

Image Credits: Lecture 1. Edmund Fuller, Lecture 2. Julius Olsson, Lecture 3. E.Charlton Fortune, Lecture 4. W.H.Y.Titcomb, Lecture 5. Robert Borlase Smart, Lecture 6. Donald Angier,  Lecture 7. Leonard Fuller