Modern British - An exhibition of renowned contemporary British artists

On Saturday 31st July until Sunday 28th August, Creative Art Gallery Woodstock are proudly showcasing Modern British, a rare exhibition of Original Lithographs, Limited Edition Silk-screens, etchings and screen-prints by renowned British Artists including, Francis Bacon, Tracey Emin, Henry Moore, Terry Frost, Damien Hirst and John Piper to name but a few.

For one month only, Creative Gallery Woodstock is dedicating their exhibition space to some of the most prestigious names in contemporary art, showcasing some of the most influential, cutting edge and admired British artists.

Creative will also be exhibiting the work of Graham Sutherland, official World War II Artist and Neo-romantic landscape artist of the 1930s; sculptor and print-maker Lynn Chadwick; Sandra Blow one of the pioneering abstract painters who used discarded materials in her works; John Hoyland RA, an English painter and printmaker who uses tactile paint surfaces; Mary Fedden OBE RA, Landscape & Still Life Painter; and Victor Pasmore, one of the leading abstract painters of our time.

All of the work is for sale and ranges in price from £250 to £4,000.

Francis Bacon, widely acclaimed as one of the 20^th Century’s greatest figure painters, was an expressionist who captured sexuality, violence and isolation with his fearless depictions of the anxieties of modern society. He used bold graphic and often tortured imagery to portray friends and acquaintances. He has had 3 major retrospectives at the Tate and the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York.

Tracey Emin RA, is a famous autobiographical artist who was part of the YBAs, (Young British Artists) and part of the Sensation exhibition with Saatchi that brought her fame and fortune! She is trained in fine art, textiles and printmaking and often uses prints alongside her installations as a creative output for documented her life. In 2007 she represented Britain at the Venice Biennale and was chosen to join the Royal Academy. In 2008 through to 2009 she had her first retrospective.

Radical, experimental and avant-garde, Henry Moore was one of Britain's greatest artists. Famous for his sculpture work Moore was also a brilliant draughtsman influenced at a young age by the greats such as Michelangelo and Rodin. We are exhibiting some of her Sheep Portfolio; “We expect Henry Moore to give a certain nobility to everything he draws; but more surprising is the way these drawings express a feeling of real attention for their subject.” Kenneth Clark, Art Historian

Giant of Abstract art, Terry Frost, began painting as a prisoner of War. “In prisoner-of-war camp I got tremendous spiritual experience, a more aware or heightened perceptions during starvation, and I honestly do not think that awakening has ever left me.” After the war Frost moved to St.Ives where he spent the rest of his life, working and living off the inspiration of Cornish light, the sea and sun; abstracting natures shapes and producing bold, brightly coloured works. He was asked to join the Royal Academy in 1992, knighted in 1998 and had a major retrospective.

Damien Hirst, is arguably the most famous of the YBAs (Young British Artists) after exhibiting the now famous Physical Impossibility of Death in the Mind of Someone Living, a tiger shark in a glass tank of formaldehyde, at the Sensation exhibition. Hirst's best known works are his spin and spot paintings, medicine cabinet sculptures, and glass tank installations. His work deals predominately with death; culminating in For the Love of God, in which a human skull was recreated in platinum and adorned with 8,601 diamonds worth approximately £15,000,000. Hirst is reputed to be the richest living artist to date; he is certainly one of the most famous of contemporary art!

John Piper, is among one of the 20^th century’s British top celebrated painters and printmakers. After beginning his work in a way very abstract manner, he later often focused on the British landscape, especially churches. He spent most of his life in Henley-on-Thames in Oxfordshire and it is some of his local scenes that we have on exhibition. Piper has had many major retrospectives over the years including one at Tate Britain in 1983/84.

Graham Sutherland was an English artist, specializing in etching and engraving, who did not start painting until his early 30s. As part of first works Sutherland focused on the inherent strangeness of natural forms, and abstracting them, sometimes giving his work a surrealist appearance. After a visit to Pembrokeshire in 1934 he fell in love with the landscape and spent most of his life here. It was this scenery that inspired his imaginative neo-romantic work.

Artist and Sculptor Lynn Chadiwck trained as an architectural draughtsman, but began producing metal mobile sculpture during the 1940s. In the 1960s Chadwick produced a series of sculptures based on pyramids. The sculptures are of an elementary nature, and strictly in the form of geometrical figures that appear to represent fantastic animals or shapes of bodies in space. His print works often share these geometric lines and shapes when dealing with the figure.

During the 1950s, Sandra Blow was one of the pioneering abstract painters who introduced into British art a new expressive informality, using cheap, discarded materials such as sawdust, sackcloth and plaster alongside the more familiar material of paint. In the 1960s her work progressed using torn paper and college as a response to the climate. After a teaching spell at the Royal Academy in the 1960s she was appointed honorary fellow of the academy. She has had retrospectives at the Tate St.Ives and the Royal Academy.

John Hoyland is one of the country's leading abstract painters. In the 1960s Hoyland's work was characterized by simple shapes, high-key colour and a flat picture surface. He began to use the technique of staining the canvas and his interaction of unmixed colours led to an emphasis on the material weight of paint. In the 1970s his paintings became more texture and he used more tactile paint surfaces. Hoyland applied these methods also to screen prints, lithographs and later to etchings and monotypes. He too has had successful retrospectives of his work at the Serpentine Gallery, 1979, Royal Academy, 1999 and Tate St.Ives, 2006.

Mary Fedden studied painting at the Slade School of Art in the 1930s. After the war was over she developed her own style of still life and flower paintings, similar to that of Matisse. Her subjects are often executed in a bold, expressive style with vivid and contrasting colours. Her still-lifes are often placed in front of a landscape, and she enjoys the contrasting of disparate, even quirky elements. In 2008 the Portland Gallery in London held a major restrospective of her work that included over 125 pieces spanning over 6 decades!

Previously a representational painter of landscapes, still life and figures Victor Pasmore became well known for his later abstract paintings, colleges and constructions. He represented Britain in the Venice Biennale in 1961.