THE ART OF GREAT BARDFIELD - WOLFSON COLLEGE

Great Bardfiled by Eric Ravilous

Is Great Bardfield the English Bauhaus ? How can it have been neglected for so long ? An entire raft of artists, the most famous was Eric Ravilious rocked up there from the 1930s onward to practice art which spanned the disciplines of painting water colours, sculpture and most of all and strikingly contemporary print making. Only true devotees of the work done there over the decades appear to have anything but a hazy appreciation of the powerhouse of imagination which stamped its mark on pre and post war twentieth century life.

Once glimpsed it is hard to forget and it slips seamlessly into the visual memory. ‘Oh yes’ you murmur to yourself, I know that, I' have seen that. Who are these people again?

Great Bardfield Landing

This remarkable outpouring of art is now on display at Wolfson College curated by Peter Donovan, every weekend until the end of March and its an eye opener. Great Bardfield was the village that lured an entire cohort of artists led by Edward Bawden and Charlotte Epton with Eric and Tirzah Ravilious, friends from the Royal College of Art who had had enough of London.They had cycled around the villages around Braintree led by local boy Bawden and hit on Great Bardfield by happenstance. Its houses were cheap and over the years more families joined them in these beautiful but rough and ready cottages - locals had often moved out to cosier more solid Council houses. These were no airy detached artistes of the French style. By 1939 many joined the Official War Artists , making way for others like Michael Rothenstein and his wife Duffy. Then the bombing in London propelled more young artists out to Essex - Kenneth and Diana Rowntree, helped by the Raviliouses, found a large dilapidated home in Lindsell nearby and textile designers and stage design artists joined. By the early 1950s they were hard at work. Posters for the underground issued from their studios, they were nothing if not engaged, and joined in the domestic art of the post war era.

‘Mr and Mrs. Ravilious Reunited’ - but sadly not for long, the brilliant Eric Ravilious,most admired of the Great Bardfield artists, died on a flying mission in the war.

Grayson Perry lived on the outskirts of Great Bardfield during his teenage years, and delivered newspapers there. It was while collecting in monies on Saturdays that he got to know a family in the village, and had wide-ranging conversations with them. They weren’t artists themselves, but they opened up possibilities for him which he later says ‘saved his life’. Richard Bawden or Chloe Cheese fostered a new generation who grew up in this amazing creative atmosphere and kept the light aflame. They represent the continuing artistic tradition which they experienced as children growing up in Great Bardfield. Grayson Perry has forged his own artistic directions, but values the work of these Bardfield Artists greatly.

Eric Ravilious Hovis Mill

The Great Bardfield production line was immensely busy. Dedicated artists they did not scorn the commercial commissions offered and speed their work through advertising, magazines, stage and costume designs and book covers. This small Essex village was astonishingly fertile.

Don’t wait. Get connected with his huge movement in English visual art right now. Start with Wolfson for a starter and move on to the Fry Gallery, now the epicentre of all this brilliance

www.fryartgallery.org

Walter Hoyle gouache and paint.