Painting the Warmth of the Sun

St Ives Artists 1939-1975

by Tom Cross

Book cover: Painting the Warmth of the Sun

Publisher: The Lutterworth Press

Subjects: Art & Art History

Language: English

Paperback (No longer our product)

(February 1985)

ISBN: 9780718826154

Price: $15.00

Out of stock

The absorbing story of the artists’ colony at St Ives, which from the outbreak of the Second World War attracted some of the most progressive painters and sculptors of the day, and which was to exert a significant influence on the course of modern art.


By 1918 St Ives had a long tradition as an artists’ community. It took as its standard the Royal Academy, which retained great popular appeal, but was neither forward-looking nor progressive. In 1920 it became the permanent home of one of the great innovators of the twentieth century, the potter Bernard Leach. At the outbreak of the Second World War it provided shelter for a small group of the most progressive painters and sculptors, including notably Ben Nicholson and Barbara Hepworth, already leaders in the advanced art movements of the 1930s, and committed to the principle of abstraction. In the 1940s and 1950s a remarkable group of younger artists came together in and around St Ives, making it a centre of avant-garde art activity. This book is concerned with those artistic events, especially during the years 1939-75, and the larger circumstances in the world of art by which they were affected, or which were affected by them. It describes the singular contribution of St Ives to the art of our time.

  • By (author) Tom Cross