Bryan WYNTER

Bryan WYNTER
1915
1975

Tom CROSS opens his biographical summary of Bryan Wynter's artistic life with the following comment: 'BW was a countryman, with a fondness for wild places. In the summer of 1945 he arrived in Cornwall and camped on a hillside above St Ives.' All of the sights and impressions he garnered from that first experience became the subjects he would explore in following years through his work - the landscape, the left-over mine-workings, the standing stones, and the creatures that inhabited the rough lands and secret hideaways of the countryside.

His work passed through several phases from more representation to abstract in the search for ways of unveiling the veiled and discovering through IMOOS (Images Moving Out Onto Space) and kinetic work to reveal the relationship systems of space and image.

Michael BIRD in 2010 authors the first full-length survey of Wynter's artistic career and relates the very important place that the artist held in the history of post-war British art. Until his death in 1975, he remained working in St Ives while also participating nationally and internationally in the art scene and its progress.

His widow, Monica, a much loved and active supporter of arts organisations such as the Borlase Smart-John Wells Trust, died in summer 2011.

media

Painter in all media, constructions (IMOOS = Images Moving Out Onto Space), teacher

works and access

Works include: Two cottages (1949); Confluence (1967); Saja (1969) Tate Gallery; (all illus in Cross); Subterrain I (1961) illus in PCF

Access: Tate Gallery; Cornwall County; many public collections in UK and abroad

exhibitions

1965: Collection of six IMOOS, Waddington Galleries (all acquired for public British collections)

Posthumous:

Tate St Ives

1992: RWE, Bristol: Artists from Cornwall (selected)

2024: Truro School Art Collection, Royal Cornwall Museum, Truro (30 Jan-18 May)

memberships

1946: Co-founder of the Crypt Group, St Ives

NSA 1972-3 list

references

M Bird (2008) St Ives Artists/Place & Time; (2010) Bryan Wynter (incl 129 colour & 50 b&w illus)

Buckman (2006) Artists in Britain since 1945

T Cross (2002) Catching the Wave/Contemporary Art & Artists in Cornwall 1975-present day, Halsgrove pp30-4, photo & illus

RA (1977) British Painting 1952-1977

J LeGrice (2008) The First Eleven: St Ives Artists (photo)

McLeod, Alister J (1973) Newlyn Society of Artists 1895-1973 (NAG 12 page brochure)

Public Catalogue Foundation (2007) Cornwall & IOS, Oil Paintings in Public Ownership;

RWE (1992) Artists from Cornwall, Exh Cat, Bristol

Tate (1985) St Ives 1939-64: 25 Years of Painting, Sculpture & Pottery, biog notes p147 with photo c1962