JOHN WELLS (1907-2000)
Vista, 1955
oil on board
41 x 61 cm
Wells visited Cornwall in 1928 where he studied briefly with Stanhope Forbes and also met Ben and Winifred Nicholson and Christopher Wood. During the war, while he was working as the GP for the Scilly Isles, Wells was able to visit Barbara Hepworth and Ben Nicholson in St Ives where he also met Naum Gabo, who made a lasting impression on his work. In 1945, at the age of 38, Wells took the decision to become a full-time artist and moved to Cornwall, where he bought one of Stanhope Forbes’s former studios in Newlyn.
Provenance
Acquired directly from the artist by JP Hodin, and thence by descent to the previous owner.
Exhibited
Tate St Ives, John Wells: The Fragile Cell, May - November 1998, no.38.
Birmingham, The Barber Institute of Fine Arts, Cornwall as Crucible: Modernity and Internationalism in Mid-Century Britain, February - May 2020.
Welbeck, Harley Gallery, Coast, Country, City, August - November 2021.
Literature
J.P. Hodin 'The 1958 Art Critics' Prize', The Studio, June 1959, illustrated p. 191 and also on the cover. T. Cross, Painting the Warmth of the Sun: St Ives Artists 1939-1975, Tiverton, 1995 (revised edition), p.68.