Frank Gascoigne HEATH

Frank Gascoigne HEATH
1873
1936

Born in Coulsdon, Surrey, Heath studied at South Kensington, Croydon and Westminster. He was also a student in Antwerp and at the Herkomer School at Bushey, in Hertfordshire, where he became an admirer of the work of Stanhope FORBES. It was that which brought him to Newlyn around 1901. Though he was not an enrolled student of the Forbes School, he evidently joined in many of the social events associated with the School. He lived and worked variously at Paul, Newlyn, and Lamorna. On his marriage to fellow student Jessica DOHERTY in 1910, the couple lived in Polperro, where their two daughters were born. 

In 1912 they built their family home at Menwinnion, near Paul in Cornwall. Heath served with Royal Fusiliers in WWI, and suffered poor health and depression for the rest of his life as a result of being gassed in France in 1915. His closest ties were to Newlyn Society of Artists, and he exhibited with STISA irregularly.

media

Painter of landscapes, figures and coastal subjects; etching

works and access

Works include: Porthminster Beach, St Ives; illustration of Heath oil of Harbour with sea gulls (IG, 1909);  In the Cowshed; Evening on the Cliffs and The Braken Cutter (c1920); Madonna Lilies (1921); Boy and Ferret (1921); Digging Potatoes on the Cliff (1921); The Keigwin Arms (1925, drypoint etching); Girl Plucking Goose (1928); A summer afternoon (repr Hardie 2009)

Access to:  Gulls, Newlyn Harbour (1909) at RCM, Truro

exhibitions

RA (25) 1914; 

Paris Salon

NAG May 1902 (first gallery sale), March 1909, September 1920 Revival Exhibition, Spring 1921, Spring 1925, December 1925, Spring 1926, July and December 1926, Summer 1928, Summer 1929, March 1931

WCAA Founding Art Auction (2004), Queen's Hotel (Donation from grand-daughter)

memberships

NSA

references

Personal bibliography

Bedford (1995) Frank Gascoigne Heath and his ‘Newlyn School’ friends at Lamorna (illus in colour & b/w)

Bedford (2009) 'The Heaths', a biographical essay about Jessica and Frank Heath (p103 in Hardie 2009)

General

Cornish Telegraph (25 Mar 1909)

Benezit

Crespon-Halotier (p 260)

Fox (1985) Painting in Newlyn

Graves RA Dictionary 1769-1904

Green (2002) Posing the Model

Hardie (1995) 100 Years in Newlyn: Diary of a Gallery

Hardie (2009) Artists in Newlyn and West Cornwall

Johnson & Greutzner (1975) Dictionary of British Artists

NAG sales records (repr Hardie 2009)

Newton et al (2005) Painting at the Edge

RCPS Exhibitors list (J F Tonkin)

Public Catalogue Foundation (2007) Cornwall & Isles of Scilly: Oil Paintings in Public Collections

Tovey (2003) Creating a Splash

Tovey (2021) Polperro - Cornwall's Forgotten Art Centre - Volume One - Pre-1920, Wilson Books

Tovey (2022) Lamorna - An Artistic, Social and Literary History - Volumes I & II, Wilson Books

Wallace (2002) Under the Open Sky

 Wormleighton (1995) A Painter Laureate