Robert Bevan

Robert Polhill Bevan (5 August 1865 – 8 July 1925) was a British painter, draughtsman and lithographer who was married to the Polish-born artist Stanisława de Karłowska. He was a founding member of the Camden Town Group, the London Group, and the Cumberland Market Group.

Early life He was born in Brunswick Square, Hove, near Brighton, the fourth of six children of Richard Alexander Bevan (1834–1918), a banker, and Laura Maria Polhill. The Bevans had been a Quaker family with long associations with Barclays Bank. They were descended from Silvanus Bevan the Plough Court apothecary and Robert Barclay the Quaker Apologist. The family, who could trace direct descent from Iestyn ap Gwrgant, had left Wales in the 17th century and settled in London.

His first teacher of drawing was Arthur Ernest Pearce, of that year has been described as "one of the first exercises in the expressive use of pure colour in this century". Bevan's early experiments in colour can also be seen in his The Mill Pool which recalls the Talisman picture that Sérusier painted to Gauguin's instructions and was described as being "quite different in colour and really rather superior". However his first one-man exhibition in 1905, which contained probably the most radical paintings by a British artist at that time, was not a commercial success and was hardly noticed by the critics. "Bevan evidently lost confidence in the direction it pointed and never again produced so outstanding a painting of this type. Sir Philip Hendy, in his preface to the 1961 Bevan retrospective exhibition at Colnaghi's, commented that Bevan was perhaps the first Englishman to use pure colour in the 20th Century. He was certainly far in advance of his Camden Town colleagues in this respect."

Bevan's second exhibition, in 1908, of largely Sussex scenes included the first of his paintings in the divisionist or pointillist style of which the best examples are Ploughing on the Downs (Aberdeen Art Gallery) and The Turn-Rice Plough (Yale Center for British Art).

In the same year Bevan submitted five works to the first Allied Artists' Association in London's Albert Hall—a non-juried, subscription show founded by Frank Rutter to promote progressive artists and based on the French Salon des Indépendants. (Wassily Kandinsky showed in England for the first time at the second exhibition in 1909.)

Having worked largely in isolation since returning from Pont-Aven, Bevan's paintings were noticed by Harold Gilman and Spencer Gore and he was invited to join Walter Sickert's Fitzroy Street Group. It was Sickert who encouraged him to "paint what really interests you and look around and see the beauty of everyday things". Thus began a series of paintings recording the decline of the horse cab trade, for example The Cab Horse (Tate gallery).

Camden Town Group

In May 1911 the decision was made to form a new exhibiting society from the ranks of Fitzroy Street and so the Camden Town Group was founded. The end of that year saw Bevan moving away from the portrayal of the cab yards to the London horse sales at Tattersalls, Aldridges, the Barbican, and Wards (see Horse Sale at the Barbican, Tate Gallery and Under the Hammer, Walker Art Gallery, Liverpool).

The Camden Town Group was short-lived. After three financially unsuccessful exhibitions Arthur Clifton, who ran the Carfax Gallery, declined to hold any more. However he still continued to back individual members and Bevan had his third one-man show there in 1913.

In 1913, The Cabyard, Night, the only painting by Bevan acquired for a public collection during his lifetime, was bought by the Contemporary Art Society on Frank Rutter's recommendation that they should obtain it for the nation before a more discerning collector bought it.

William Marchant, of the Goupil Gallery, offered his larger premises on condition that the Group was expanded and that it changed its name. This resulted in the formation of the London Group in the autumn of 1913. Harold Gilman was elected president, J.B. Manson secretary and Bevan treasurer.

From April 1914 until September 1915 Bevan rented a studio in Cumberland Market, London's hay and straw market in Camden Town. It was here that the Cumberland Market Group consisting of Bevan, Gilman, Charles Ginner and John Nash held Saturday afternoon 'at homes'. The four exhibited at the Goupil Gallery in May 1915 and were later joined by Edward McKnight Kauffer and C.R.W. Nevinson.

Last years

Bevan spent most of his summers painting. Until the First World War this was usually at family homes in Poland or Sussex. However, at about this time, he was first invited down to the Blackdown Hills on the Devon-Somerset border as a guest of landowner and amateur artist Harold Harrison. Until the end of his life Bevan continued to paint in the Bolham valley and nearby Luppitt his angular style sitting well with the strong patterning of the landscape.

His London street scenes, which were largely in the area of St John's Wood and Belsize Park, were generally more favourably reviewed than his landscapes.

After a break of nearly twenty years Bevan returned to lithography. Whilst his earlier prints recall landscapes by Van Gogh the later works are more in the nature of tone translations of oil paintings. "In either instance they are technically superb and notable additions to English lithography of the period."

In 1922 he was elected to the New English Art Club.

Bevan died on 8 July 1925, following an operation for stomach cancer.

Legacy

Despite memorial shows in 1926 and an Arts Council exhibition in 1956, his unique contribution to British art was not widely recognized until 1965, the centenary of his birth. ensured that most of his works were unsold and a considerable number were left to his wife on his death. Stanislawa Bevan left her estate equally between her son R. A. Bevan and daughter Mrs Charles Baty. In 1961 they presented the Ashmolean Museum, Oxford with The Bevan Gift in honour of their parents' work. As well as a number of paintings, drawings and lithographs this included the 27 surviving Bevan sketchbooks. Further works were added subsequently.

He was one of nine out of the 17-strong Camden Town Group to be shown in a major retrospective of the group at Tate Britain in London in 2008.

Works by Bevan can be found in many public collections in the United Kingdom. He is also represented in public collections in Australia; France; New Zealand; South Africa and the USA.

Robert Bevan was the great grandfather of the historian of architectural paint and colour, Patrick Baty.

Works on show An exhibition entitled A Countryman in Town: Robert Bevan and the Cumberland Market Group was held at the Southampton City Art Gallery from 26 September – 14 December 2008 and it moved to Abbot Hall Art Gallery from 13 January – 21 March 2009.

More works were seen in an exhibition held at Gainsborough's House, Sudbury, in Suffolk from 4 October to 13 December 2008. The show was entitled From Sickert to Gertler: Modern British Art from Boxted House.

Gallery

Notes and references