Frida Kahlo: Now, there's a name to be reckoned with. More than just a painter, a global phenomenon, a superstar who died too young. And so coming to Tate Modern on June 25 we have Frida: The Making of an Icon , surely set to be one of the most in-demand tickets in London this year. It's not so much a show about Frida, though, as about the cult of Frida: More than 30 of her works are accompanied by some 200 by contemporaries and those from later generations whom she inspired, and then there are over 200 objects exploring "Fridamania". The show had good reviews when it was on at the Museum of Fine Arts in Houston, and you've got until January 3 to catch it at the Tate. While we're on the subject of mid 20th-century female icons whose candle burned out long before their legend ever did.... Marilyn Monroe: A Portrait starts at the National Portrait Gallery on June 4. The Hollywood star would have been 100 years old this year, and this show, running until Sept...
A couple of weeks ago, we saw how Vincent van Gogh's Sunflowers were enormously influential on the work of 20th-century British artists. In works by Frank Brangwyn, Jacob Epstein and Christopher Wood on display at Tate Britain, there was daring colour and brushwork, and yet their sunflowers and chrysanthemums were instantly recognisable.
But we've just been to see a show featuring another British flower painter whose work is really quite different. Ivon Hitchens painted landscapes and plants inside and outside his secluded West Sussex studio with vibrant use of colour, but over a long career his canvases became increasingly abstract. Ivon Hitchens: The Painter in the Woods at the Garden Museum in London tells part of his story.
Hitchens was at one stage a pretty big name: In the 1950s he had regular major exhibitions in London, represented Britain at the Venice Biennale in 1956 and had no difficulty in finding buyers for his works. And he's right back in the spotlight this year, because the Pallant House Gallery in Chichester is staging the biggest exhibition of his work in three decades starting next month.
This much smaller show at the Garden Museum focuses on what Hitchens did after he moved to a caravan in the woodlands near Petworth in 1940 with his wife Mollie and infant son. They'd been bombed out of their London home (and his studio). Hitchens had bought the caravan for £20. They gradually built a new home, named Greenleaves, around it, initially without running water or power.
And here we see the view from Hitchens's Studio with Open Doors in 1942. There's a staircase on the left, with a view into the garden and the woods beyond.
Perhaps the most spectacular picture in this show is the most abstracted, right near the end, from 1976, three years before Hitchens's death, when he was already in his 80s. It's called Red Splash. And it really does make quite a splash, showing that the artist was by no means standing still in his old age.
This show only has about 20 pictures, and the display space at the Garden Museum is quite cramped, so we felt that this was a not fully satisfying taster of Hitchens's work (and if you're only planning to visit the museum to see this, it has to be said that it's not the best-value-for-money art exhibition in London). Let's see what Chichester has to offer.
Ivon Hitchens, Sunflowers and Blue Jar, c. 1947, National Galleries of Scotland, Edinburgh.
Ivon Hitchens, Flowers Red and Gold, c. 1949, Richard Green Gallery, London
Ivon Hitchens, Irises -- Greenleaves, c. 1952, Private collection. © The estate of Ivon Hitchens
Ivon Hitchens, Red Splash, 1976, Private collection
But we've just been to see a show featuring another British flower painter whose work is really quite different. Ivon Hitchens painted landscapes and plants inside and outside his secluded West Sussex studio with vibrant use of colour, but over a long career his canvases became increasingly abstract. Ivon Hitchens: The Painter in the Woods at the Garden Museum in London tells part of his story.
Hitchens was at one stage a pretty big name: In the 1950s he had regular major exhibitions in London, represented Britain at the Venice Biennale in 1956 and had no difficulty in finding buyers for his works. And he's right back in the spotlight this year, because the Pallant House Gallery in Chichester is staging the biggest exhibition of his work in three decades starting next month.
This much smaller show at the Garden Museum focuses on what Hitchens did after he moved to a caravan in the woodlands near Petworth in 1940 with his wife Mollie and infant son. They'd been bombed out of their London home (and his studio). Hitchens had bought the caravan for £20. They gradually built a new home, named Greenleaves, around it, initially without running water or power.
And here we see the view from Hitchens's Studio with Open Doors in 1942. There's a staircase on the left, with a view into the garden and the woods beyond.
This is already a fairly abstracted image, with flat blocks of colour and very broad brushstrokes. The style, with elements of Matisse and Cézanne, is carried over into flower paintings such as Sunflowers and Blue Jar.
If it all looks a bit wild, that's because it was, apparently. The garden was rambling and undisciplined, but Hitchens loved painting outside when the weather was fine, amid overgrown borders that were occasionally beaten back into shape by a gardener.
The first painting you see in this show is a landscape from 1938 of Lavington Common, the area he settled in. It's full of greens and browns, but as time goes on, you can see Hitchens's painting becoming more colourful, full of reds and yellows.
For landscapes, Hitchens preferred working with a very wide canvas: He thought it was natural to read it from left to right, like a piece of music. A square-shaped landscape, as favoured by Gustav Klimt, for example, was "usually unsatisfactory because the natural flow of the horizontals is checked".
And here in Irises -- Greenleaves, the eye moves from the yellow irises on the left across to the scene on the right, which may represent Hitchens's studio.
Practicalities
Ivon Hitchens: The Painter in the Woods is on at the Garden Museum until July 15. It's open from 1030 to 1700 Sundays to Fridays, and until 1600 on Saturdays. Full-price entry to the museum, including a climb up the medieval tower for a view across the Thames to Westminster, is £10. The Garden Museum is located right next to Lambeth Palace, 10 minutes walk from either Waterloo or Vauxhall rail and Tube stations.
Images
Ivon Hitchens, Studio with Open Doors, c. 1942, Private collection. © The estate of Ivon HitchensIvon Hitchens, Sunflowers and Blue Jar, c. 1947, National Galleries of Scotland, Edinburgh.
Ivon Hitchens, Flowers Red and Gold, c. 1949, Richard Green Gallery, London
Ivon Hitchens, Irises -- Greenleaves, c. 1952, Private collection. © The estate of Ivon Hitchens
Ivon Hitchens, Red Splash, 1976, Private collection
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