Born in Western Australia, Fred Whicker immigrated to Britain where he took up work as a printer at the Bristol Times and Mirror. By attending evening classes at the Bristol Art School he met and married (1931) a fellow artist Gwendoline CROSS, known as Gwen. He joined the New Bristol Arts Club and exhibited at the RWA, as did Gwen.
Buckman mentions that at least to begin with, he was much influenced by his wife's excellent draughtsmanship, though later becoming more experimental and extending to figure and landscape paintings. After WWII, they moved to Falmouth, where Gwen took up teaching at Falmouth Art School and became one of the Governors of the School.
A retrospective for the couple was presented in 1994 at the Falmouth Art Gallery, and an appreciative monograph was penned by Catherine Wallace to accompany the exhibition.
Catherine Wallace wrote (1994) in her retrospective catalogue for the exhibition of works by Gwen and Fred WHICKER, that they 'never received deserved acclaim in their own lifetime, mainly because their art was not seen to be fashionable at the time….two highly competent representational painters who ran adrift on the rocks of the modernist movement.’
Gwen Cross was born in Bristol and studied art, against her parents’ wishes at the Bristol Municipal School of Art. She worked her way through studies by making medical drawings for Bristol University. A very skilful draughtswoman, she was always drawn to nature, portraiture, animals and birds, and these she depicted through the medium of printmaking and etching as well as oil painting.
After achieving her Diploma in Fine Art and a teaching qualification she taught at the Bristol Art School, where she met her future husband Fred Whicker. They were married in 1931 and lived in Clifton from that time when Fred was working as a printer until after WWII. During this period they both achieved their greatest acclaim, given impetus by the formation of the New Bristol Arts Club (1933), of which Gwen served as President. Their first exhibition was held at the Royal West of England Academy, where Gwen had shown work previously, and Fred had also exhibited one work in 1931. The 1930s were in fact to be their ‘golden period’ when academic painting of their sort was still appreciated. The war broke that success.
The couple moved to Falmouth, Cornwall shortly after the war and lived on Woodlane. They exhibited at the RCPS and associated themselves with the St Ives Society of Artists. But the modernists were beginning to hold sway, and their work was overlooked. They continued to paint still life and domestic scenes, and Gwen to make silver jewellery for sale in shops, but they had virtually no money for working materials, and lived a very impecunious existence.
Gwen served as a Governor of the Falmouth Art School, and they both quietly continued to work at their paintings, exhibiting and selling when possible, and mainly with STISA.
Sam While works at Shallal Studios in the grounds of the John Daniel Centre in Penzance.
Trained in art at Birkenhead and Liverpool School of Art, and under Julius OLSSON and John Alfred Arnesby BROWN. She also lived at Heswall, Cheshire. Her main exhibiting venue was in Liverpool (56) at the Walker Art Gallery.
A portrait of Wing Commander Guy Gibson (1918-1944) by this artist is owned by the Helston Town Council.
An army surgeon in the Coldstream Guards, the artist exhibited a number of Cornish subjects between 1873 and 1891. His wife, Agnes Sophie WHIPPLE, was a flower painter.
The American artist, known simply as Whistler, was born in Lowell, Massachusetts near Boston. He had travelled as a youth with his engineer father, living both in Russia and in England.In 1855 he went as a student to Paris, where he met Degas, and was greatly influenced by Courbet.
By the time he came to spend the April-May of 1884 in St Ives, he was already well-known, even 'infamous', considered highly eccentric, for the 1878 quarrel with Ruskin, leading to the trial which left him with 1 farthing damages. Staying at 14 Barnoon Terrace, one of the friends he brought with him was Walter Richard SICKERT. Another was Mortimer Luddington MENPES.
In the WCAA, gifted from another artist's library is the 1904 reprint (Third Edition of the book narrating the quarrel and other side issues first printed in 1890) of the 'pirated copy of Mr Whistler's collected writings' entitled The Gentle Art of Making Enemies (Subtitled 'As pleasingly exemplified in many instances, wherein the serious ones of this earth, carefully exasperated, have been prettily spurred on to unseemliness and indiscreation, while overcome by an undue sense of right').
In 1984 a mini-festival was held in St Ives marking the centenary of the visit and offering exhibitions, recitals, plays and poetry. A lecture on 'Whistler and St Ives' was given by artist Roy RAY at the St Ives Arts Club.
After completing a Foundation Diploma at Falmouth School of Art, Maxine Whitbread-Abrutat gained a BA (Hons) in Fashion & Design at Cheltenham College of Art. She then undertook a PGCE in Art & Design at De Montfort University.
In 1991 she returned to Cornwall, becoming Head of Art at a secondary school in St Austell. In 2003 Maxine became Cornwall's first Advanced Skills Teacher (AST) awarded by the Department of Education.
More recently she has graduated from Falmouth University as a Master of Fine Art. She supports the visual arts in education, with large County arts projects supporting other teachers and promoting the arts in Cornwall.
She has held a considerable number of solo shows and has participated in group exhibitions throughout Cornwall. She works from a studio near Perranporth.
David Whitbread-Roberts was born and raised in Cornwall. He and his wife Paula WHITBREAD-ROBERTS met as students on the Art Foundation Diploma course at Falmouth College of Art. They went on to study for their BA (Hons) degrees in Fine Art at Winchester School of Art, followed by a PGCE at Brighton Poly. David is a lecturer in Art & Design at Penwith College in Penzance.
Paula Whitbread-Roberts grew up in Leicester but the family moved to Cornwall when she was 19. She and her husband David WHITBREAD-ROBERTS met as students on the Art Foundation Diploma course at Falmouth College of Art. They went on to study for their BA (Hons) degrees in Fine Art at Winchester School of Art, followed by a PGCE at Brighton Poly. Paula is head of the Foundation Diploma in Art & Design at Truro College.
The son of an art metal craftsman, he was born in Sheffield and studied at Sheffield School of Art from 1880 under Henry Archer and J T Cook (along with John Gutteridge SYKES) at South Kensington, where he won a silver medal. Initially he taught art at a girls' school in Sheffield, but then decided on making a career of painting.
He looked at several seaside places in Cornwall but decided on St Ives in 1902. In June 1906 he sold Street at St Ives at NAG. By 1909 he was advertising for pupils at 4 Tre-Pol-Pen, Street-an-Pol, offering "painting in oil and watercolour, marine, landscape, figure, etc.". He is best known for his depictions of the harbour, filled with brown sailed craft, and the old cottages in Down-a-long.
White worked from Tregenna Hill Studio in the 1930s and later in his life from Fern Glade Studio, The Stennack. An unassuming man with a gentle, kindly disposition and a great sense of humour, he was also a keen and knowledgeable musician, being organist at the Catholic Church for over 25 years, although himself a Wesleyan. He was widely read on architecture and all forms of art. He never married and from 1946, needed a housekeeper to look after him. By this juncture he was struggling financially and losing his eyesight. In his final year of life he sent work to the RA that was rejected. His stroke was probably precipitated by the emotional upset this caused him. On his death his niece and her son sold off his paintings cheaply in a local pub.
Jon White grew up in Cornwall. After studying theology at university in London, he moved to Normandy, France, where he worked for a non-profit organisation, Bless, and freelanced as an artist/illustrator. In New York in 2014, while apprenticed to the artist and author Makoto Fujimura, White came to the realisation that his love for art and theology could be combined. In 2016 he spent nine months in Los Angeles studying for a Masters in theology and art, at Fuller Theological Seminary.
Having returned to Cornwall, Jon creates both seascapes and abstract works incorporating 'Nihonga' - a Japanese technique involving the use of ground minerals and precious stones such as malachite, azurite and gold and silver leaf.
Alan White's first name was Frank, but he always signed his work and was known by his second name Alan. He was born in Loughborough, son of a perfume works manager Frank Robert White and Ethel Mary White.
A copy of a 1911 census lists him as a 17-year old art student. He later lived in the Rutland village of Whissendine in the 1960s, during which time he was a regular visitor to the Gernick Field Studio in Newlyn. It was here that he and his friends Charles BREAKER and Eric HILLER established a holiday sketching group.
White was always based in the East Midlands and died in Oakham in 1974.
A correspondent (2018) whose uncle was a friend of the artist and who owns a number of White's paintings has offered the above information. He praises the artist's style, which he describes as distinctive, showing great intricacy, detail and accuracy. The subjects indicate a familiarity not only with the East Midlands, but also with the Bodmin or Dartmoor areas. White also produced a number of miniatures. The correspondent suggests that Alan White's work deserves greater recognition.
Peta White was born in Surrey and moved to Cornwall in 2006. She lived in Constantine, near Falmouth. She described herself as an 'outsider' artist.
Born on 21 November 1854 in Royal Leamington Spa, Warwickshire (GRO). A Newlyn title was exhibited by the artist in 1892. She often accompanied her brother, the artist FWN Whitehead (fl 1870-1902), on painting expeditions. He may well have paid a working visit at the same time, but no information at present. Her permanent working address was in Leamington, and she died there, aged 81, on 18 June, 1934 (GRO).