Braybrooks' relief artwork compositions reflect his keen interest in the fauna and flora of west Cornwall, and its place in the landscape.
A Coventry painter, Amy Brazil spent a great deal of time in Polperro, where her sister, the writer Angela Brazil, had acquired a holiday home. In 1932, at an exhibition of the Coventry Society of Artists, her impression of evening at Polperro was considered to be her outstanding exhibit. This painting was highly regarded when it was included in her solo show at Walker's Galleries, New Bond Street, in 1934. Entitled 'An Exhibition of Watercolours of Polperro and Other Places' the show contained, among its 62 works, at least 19 watercolours of Polperro and other Cornish scenes.
In 1937 Amy, along with two other women artists, held an exhibition at Cheltenham Art Gallery.
Very little of her work has appeared on the market. A portrait photo of her is held by the National Portrait Gallery.
Ryya Bread is an American-born artist and curator who has lived in West Cornwall for almost 20 years. She received her first art training in the US, but completed her PhD in Fine Art at the Falmouth College of Art. While a student she did some voluntary and commissioned work for the Hypatia Trust, and followed this up by assisting the initial team at work on the formation and cataloguing of the West Cornwall Art Archive (WCAA). After running her own gallery together with the artist, Baz MEHEW in Bread Street, Penzance, for some years she was employed as an assistant curator for the Lemon Street Gallery, Truro.
She is married to the boat-builder and sculptor, David SANDERS, and the couple live in Falmouth.
From 2010 she is Curator of the art gallery at Kestle Barton, the Lizard Peninsula, Cornwall.
Charles Breaker was born at Bowness on Lake Windermere. In the early 1930s, he went to Spain with his life-long companion and friend, the illustrator and watercolourist, Eric HILLER. Finding themselves in the midst of the Civil War, they moved on to Madeira, South Africa, Morocco, Capri, and finally Brittany, for painting purposes.
At the outbreak of WWII, Breaker returned to England, working in the drawing office of an aircraft factory. In 1947 he and Hiller moved to Cornwall, settling in Newlyn and, with the organising assistance of artist Marjorie MORT in 1948, they began the Holiday Sketching Group based at the Gernick Field Studio where they lived (See Hardie 1995). Breaker, a wonderful enthusiast, was active in arts social activities on both sides of the peninsula, maintaining memberships in both STISA and NSA, the latter of which he served as Chairman betwen 1957-8 and 1961-3. Much of his art work was in watercolour, and showed a spontaneous energy and colourful regard for the life he depicted, be it boats around the harbour and poster-style events.
He is especially remembered for his exciting knitted jerkins and sweaters that he made for himself and for friends, occasionally selling them for extra funds for the classes at Gernick Field (which continued until 1965). He introduced a wild array of colours in intricate design, and inspired a number of noted followers in art-knitwear, especially his niece Pat PICKLES and another artist friend, Jane AKEROYD. A Breaker knit is still treasured today and is immediately recognisable wherever it is worn. In 1986 Pickles and other former pupils mounted a Memorial Exhibition to honour this well-loved artist.
A recent correspondent added to our information about Charles and Eric with the following:
'I first met Newlyn artists in the 1960's, including Eric Alfred HILLER and Charles Clark Breaker. Eric was born in 1893 (not shown on your list) Also another artist there at that time was Alan WHITE (Frank Alan White)1893 - 1974. Could this be the one about which you had no information. He was a water colourist and I have several examples of his work. He was a friend of Charles Breaker and often
lived at Gernick Field in those days.'
Alicia Breakspear is an artist who works experimentally in a variety of media. She graduated in marine and natural history photography at Falmouth University in 2020 and is based at Krowji studios, Redruth.
As part of her art practice, she conducts botanical printmaking workshops.
The artist was born on 19 January 1856, Birmingham, West Midlands and died on 8 May 1914 in London, age 57 (GRO). He studied art in Paris and came under the influence of Thomas Couture. Though his sending-in address was mainly in London (1882-1889), by 1884 he appears in the 1884 group photograph of Newlyn artists. He exhibited regularly at the RA, SS and the Grafton Gallery. In 1887 his sending-in address was given as Manchester.
With a specialty in genre or storytelling pictures, he mainly concentrated on painting 18th century costume pieces, of which he was a prolific exhibitor.
He was a founding member of the Birmingham Art Circle, and a lifelong friend of Edwin HARRIS. In one of Frank BRAMLEY's letters from Venice, to his colleague William John WAINWRIGHT back in England, he writes in 1883 that Breakspeare 'was working hard on the small island of Burano (Bay of Venice) and liked Venice very much.' Both Bramley and Breakspeare were to turn up in Newlyn the following year.
British artist, 20th Century; no further information is currently available.
Susie Breeze is a fine art and craft pyrographer working in Cornwall. Using locally sourced wood, she explores landscapes, wildlife, sealife, botanicals, portraits and text.
Noel Brennan is a sculptor and prop maker with a background in graphic design. After over 25 years experience in the television and exhibition industry, he moved to mid Cornwall in 2015 to focus on his artistic career. In 2017 he opened a gallery and workshop, Casting Ashes, in St Columb.
Brennan moved to St Ives, Cornwall in the early 1950s as a self-taught painter and supported himself by waiting tables in a local cafe. There he met David LEWIS, also waiting tables prior to deciding what routes in art to follow. Later Lewis would write the introduction to the exhibition catalogue for a solo show by Brennan, and he is mentioned in Lewis's memoir to introduce the Tate publication about 25 years of art in St Ives [ref]. He was elected a member of the Penwith Society in 1957, and developed an interest in monotypes. In 1970 he spent three months working in Holland.
Claire Brennan is a St Ives-based painter. Her work is shown regularly at STISA open exhibitions.
The artist was born Ralph Richard Creak-Davis, in Oxford, the son of a solicitor. He changed his name to Angus Brent by deed poll in 1938. He studied at St Martin's School of Art, and privately with Bertram Nicholls, and exhibited widely (including the RA and Fine Art Society, London and New Zealand). Much of his work was done in Hampshire, where according to Buckman he showed in Southampton and Bournemouth and lived at Fordingbridge.
In 1951 Brent travelled with his wife Nina to New Zealand, where he exhibited with the Auckland Society of Arts.
His work was selected by Michael CANNEY for the exhibition which he curated (and in which he also exhibited) for the City Art Gallery in Plymouth, entitled 'Painters in Cornwall 1960'. Canney commented in his introduction....'Apart from London, there is nowhere else in this country where so many artists are working in such a small area...' Brent became a member of the NSA in Canney's time and remained so for the rest of his life.
His death was recorded in the New Forest, Hampshire.
John Brenton grew up near St Austell. He obtained a degree in Creative Arts from Alsager College (now part of Manchester University) and returned to Cornwall in 1995, holding his first exhibition at the Bakehouse Gallery, Penzance. He lives in Sennen and paints mainly landscapes. His work has been shown in galleries throughout Cornwall.
Michael Brett has been painting the Cornish landscape for the past 20 years.
Born in Bletchingley, Surrey, the artist was a student of the RA Schools from 1853. He first visited Cornwall on honeymoon in 1870, staying on the Lizard, to which he returned repeatedly usually for several months at a time over the following thirty years. His stay at several locations in Cornwall is noted in his Biography - for example in September 1872, he was painting in St Ives.
His paintings Kennack Strand; Cornish Lions (1878); Under the Lizard Lights; Logan Bay; Porthcurnow; Newquay, Cornwall were all exhibited at the Whitechapel Exhibition of Cornish Artists in 1902. John Ruskin, becoming a close friend of the artist, praised The Stone Breaker (1858) and Val d'Aosta (1859) early in his artistic career, and later he was known mainly for Cornish seascapes. In all, he produced over two hundred paintings of Cornwall, including Mounts Bay (1877) and Britannia's Realm (1880).
The following programme note was included at the Whitechapel Exhibition: 'The painter of these pictures, who died so recently, was one of the first to carry out the ideals of the Pre-Raphaelite painters in landscape, trying to render faithfully every fissure on the rocky cliffs, every moss and heath on the hillsides. The beauty of these pictures shows how much may be attained in work of this kind.' The titles listed were all lent to the exhibition by a private collector. The artist treated all of his subjects in minute scientific detail, and was also a keen astronomer.
Port Isaac (acrylic on canvas) is the subject of a painting by this artist held in the collection of the Royal Cornwall Hospital.
Julie Brett's subjects include dramatic skies, rocky coastlines, coves, and boats drawn up on the riverbank. She has exhibited at the Spindrift Gallery in Portscatho.
Bridge works from Shallal Studios, in the grounds of the John Daniel Centre in Penzance.
Edna Bridge was born in West Ham, Essex, to Jesse Bridge and Caroline (nee Comfort). Together with her twin brother Leslie Victor, she grew up at New Hall Farm, Hockley, Essex. Much later, in the 1950's, she moved to Newlyn where she was able to set up her first small Studio. [Information provided by nephew who holds work by her in the family.]
Five paintings by this landscape and flower painter form part of the permanent collection of art in the possession of St Michael's Hospital (SMH) Hayle. Bridge was a member of the NSA and made an Honorary Life Member for her services to the Gallery. Two of her paintings are also part of the NAG collection.
A recent correspondent (2015) wrote that he had purchased a painting, St Agnes, by Edna Bridge, in St Ives in the 1960s. Another has reported a portrait painted by Bridge of his mother, Irene Greenford, which is signed.
Edna Bridge's great-nephew has been in touch (2018) to tell us of an oil painting entitled 'Mullion Cove' which he purchased recently. He inherited two further oil paintings - one of her childhood home in Hockley, and another, 'Spring in Cornwall', whose location is described by the artist as Buryas Bridge. He recalls meeting her only once, at her home and studio in Newlyn, as a child during the 1960s, when she would have been in her mid-60s.
A further correspondent (2022) whose mother was a friend of Edna Bridge, has been in touch to tell us of paintings and lino prints by the artist in her possession, along with portraits of her family. She remembers visiting Edna Bridge in Newlyn.
Lizzy Bridges works from KROWJI Studios, Redruth. Her paintings detail architectural structures. She uses reflections and reflected light to offer a slightly distorted version of reality.
Amanda Brier makes functional and decorative pottery ranging from vases, bowls and mugs to trinket boxes and hand-painted tiles.
She was born in Portsmouth, where she studied Art and Design before moving to Cornwall in 1997. She completed a degree in Studio Ceramics at Falmouth College of Arts in 2000, and has worked with the Leach Pottery since that year. She submits work regularly to galleries around Cornwall and participates in mixed exhibitions. Her work may be seen at such venues as Trelissick Gallery, Truro, Out of the Blue (Marazion), Penlee House, Penzance and others.
The abstract artist David Briggs was born in Lancashire. He studied at Falmouth College of Art and moved to St Ives in 1994.
Briggs is listed as a member of NSA (1997).
Many years ago, as a student of botany, Mim Brigham became fascinated by images of marram grass (which grows on sand dunes) cut and viewed through a microscope. Subequently she was working in social care and based in St Cleer when she took a degree at Plymouth College of Art, graduating in 2017. As a result she was selected to exhibit in the British Glass Biennale in August 2017.
She then produced a body of work entitled 'Microscopic' which has won her many accolades including the Devon Guild of Craftsmen Design Award. She has a kiln at home, and a studio at Flameworks in Plymouth. Her work, which combines her passion for art and science, can be seen in the Penwith Gallery in St Ives.
The artist maintained an address in London, and studied under Sir Arthur Cope. In 1897 she became an Associate in the Society of Women Artists with whom she frequently showed. She also exhibited at Liverpool and the RA with success. From 1909 to 1914 she studied for periods in St Ives, primarily marine painting with Julius OLSSON. Tovey (2009) includes a colour plate of her painting Sunset, Porthmeor (p244).
His painting, One Way to Porthleven, is in the loaned collection of the National Maritime Museum, Cornwall. Further information for this artist would be welcome.
Barrie Briscoe was born in Gloucester but grew up in western Canada. He was educated at Washington State University, the University of Pennsylvania, and Yale. An architect, draughtsman, designer, and occasional painter, he returned to the UK in 1972 and settled in Cornwall a year later.
In the year 2000 Briscoe created a mural on the back wall of the Acorn Theatre facing onto the Greenmarket car park, complementing the interior of the theatre when it re-opened after renovation that year. His idea was to support a competition every year for people to come up with a new design.
This American-born artist is recorded as showing two paintings at the St Ives Show Day in 1911, Moment Poetique and Evening, both of which he exhibited at NAG Winter Exhibition later the same year (which indicates they were not for sale).
He is noticed by Tovey as the occupant of the Mine Engine House studio on Pednolver Point until that year (p133).