Modern British is a survey group show that focuses on the the heyday of Modern British art in the 1930s to 1960s. Featuring work by Prunella Clough, Robert Colquhoun, John Craxton, Terry Frost, Roger Hilton, Ivon Hitchens, Peter Kinley, Peter Lanyon, Alexander Mackenzie, Kenneth Martin, Mary Martin, Cedric Morris, Paul Nash, Ben Nicholson, Victor Pasmore, William Scott, John Tunnard, Keith Vaughan
21 November - 17 January
PV 17:30 - 19:30 Wednesday 19 November (RSVP)
Open until 6pm Friday 21 November
"This exhibition focuses on a period of British art from the 1930s-1960s; a period of seismic social upheaval and artistic innovation. The impact of the Second World War on the art scene was profound and what followed was a hugely generative period in the history of British art, with artists embracing new ideas and international influences. It was a time of transformation and exploration with various art movements growing alongside each other often with very different outlooks and ideas of what art should be
In the post-war period global peace seemed to be balanced on a knife edge. The social anxiety of the age can be felt in the figurative work of artists such as Keith Vaughan, John Craxton and Robert Colquhoun. Falling loosely under the term neo-romantic, their work frequently depicted figures ill at ease, often set amongst a nocturnal landscape. De-humanised and isolated from each other they mirror this collective social experience.
Industrial post-war Britain was captured in the work of Prunella Clough. The determination to root her practice in the reality of the twentieth century by rejecting idealised landscapes in favour of the urban and industrial spaces she connected with, distilling the strangeness she encountered into ambiguous yet refined compositions. Other artists such as Paul Nash would continue to find solace in the British countryside, in nature and ideas of rejuvenation, putting the traumatic subject matter of his war paintings behind him.
The 1930s had seen a brief flirtation with abstraction, with Ben Nicholson taking the lead. However figurative painting was still very much at the forefront and early works by John Tunnard and Victor Pasmore included in the exhibition reflect this stance. It wasn’t until the 1940s that Britain would see a revival interest in abstract art with St Ives becoming the centre of constructivist experimentation; with artists such as Ben Nicholson, Barbara Hepworth and Peter Lanyon forming a vibrant modernist art community.
This artistic community would evolve further in the 1950s embracing a new vision shared with international movements such as Abstract Expressionism and Tashism. Artists, including Terry Frost, Peter Lanyon, William Scott and Alexander Mackenzie among others, produced bold and innovative paintings. Despite this move towards abstraction, landscape - particularly that of Cornwall – remained at the heart of their works, rooting them in the natural world.
Other artists like Kenneth and Mary Martin and the British Constructivists would abandon any form of figuration, placing form and colour at the centre of their works as well as mathematical systems and elements of chance.
The period between 1930 and 1960 was one of transformation and redefinition for British art. Emerging from the turmoil of war and the shifting tides of modern life, artists grappled with the ever changing nature of expression in a rapidly changing world."
Emily Austin, November 2025