The artist was born in Chicago, Illinois with the family name Simon and was also know as Gardner Symons. He studied at the Chicago Art Institute, becoming a close friend of artist William WENDT, and together they went on to paint in California and then in Cornwall (1898) where he became a plein-air artist under the tutelage of Julius OLSSON, Adrian STOKES, and Rudolph HELWAG.
The St Ives Times commented : 'Messrs Paul DOUGHERTY, Elmer SCHOFIELD and Gardner Symons are a trio of front-rank American artists who have at different times lived and worked in St Ives; the latter have become more especially famous for their snow studies, whilst Mr Dougherty devoted himself chiefly to sea-scapes and rhythmic movements of breaking waves on the coast.' Gardner Symons's primary studio was in Brooklyn, New York, though he also painted in California (Laguna Beach) and in Massachusetts. He returned to St Ives for a visit in 1914, and found an artists' community there numbering over a hundred. When the new St Ives Society of Artists began planning (1927) for a retrospective exhibition of work by former artists of St Ives, a painting by Gardner Symons was loaned for inclusion.
Andrew (Lipe) Syms has lived and worked on the north coast of Cornwall all his life, half of which he has spent painting and creating. His work is spontaneous and organic, and he has a passion for colour and texture, often building up layers until only subtle details of the early image remain.
Bridget Syms lives in Lamorna. A restorer of early European and Oriental ceramics, in 2014 she became a full-time artist.
Known to have exhibited at the Redfern Gallery, London previously, the artist exhibited the painting Old People at NAG in 1937. His Self Portrait of 1942 (oil on canvas) is in the permanent collection of Falmouth Art Gallery.
István SZEGEDI SZŰTS (7 Dec 1893 Budapest – 12 Apr 1959 Penzance) painter and illustrator
Though of Hungarian origin, the artist spent half of his adult life in the UK. He was educated at the Hungarian College of Fine Arts, Budapest, before joining the military forces in WWI. From 1926 he taught drawing for a decade in Hungary, his first exhibition of 115 graphics in Budapest Mentor Gallery being in his first year of teaching. In 1929, he visited London and held a solo exhibition at the Gieves Gallery. Amongst the 76 pictures exhibited was his most significant work, the expressionist portrait of the Hungarian author Dezső Szabó.
He published a word-less novel of his wartime experiences (1931, John Lane) entitled 'My War', containing 206 pieces of pen, ink and wash drawings in two volumes.
In 1933 a unique animation film based on 14,000 (approx) of his drawings was made in Hungary, and was also available in the UK. A copy under the Hungarian title of Légi titánok (Aerial Titans) is archived currently in the British Film Institute.
Naptárcsere (Change of Calendar), by Marai Sandor was published in 1935, containing illustrations by Szegedi Szuts, and was given the award of ‘Finest Book of the Year in Hungary’.
In 1936, the artist emigrated to Britain, moving to Cornwall with Gwynedd Jones-Parry, another painter, whom he married the following year. The couple lived at Caunce Head near Mullion, Cornwall on the Lizard Peninsula and remained there for the rest of their lives. At Caunce Head he continued his friendship with his well-known friends, the composers Zoltan Kodaly and Gyorgy Ranki.
He exhibited with the Newlyn Society of Artists and the Penwith Society of Arts. In 1962 the book 'Last letters from Stalingrad', illustrated by him, appeared posthumously.
Twenty two years following the death of his widow, in 2004, an old friend of the couple, Michael Snow, received his studio and literary remains. A self portrait from 1942 was given to the Falmouth Art Gallery and all of the remaining drawings, notes, and photos to the Hungarian Institute of Culture in London. That same year the entire legacy returned to Budapest.
In 2012 a small exhibition of his works was shown in the Petőfi Literature Museum, Budapest, which now owns the archive.
[Full entry based on the research of Bela Gomor, Budapest]
Mentioned in Whybrow's 1883-1900 list of artists in and around St Ives.
Ben Taffinder was born in Cirencester but moved to Cornwall's Roseland peninsula in 1995. He studied Fine Art at Falmouth College, then went on to create installations for outdoor sculpture events in Europe and Asia. He also worked locally as a diver and fisherman for his family business near Portscatho.
Ben took up painting full-time in 2010. His work can be seen at the Harbour Gallery in Portscatho.
Zenna Tagney was born in Gunnislake, east Cornwall, and grew up in Tywardreath, mid Cornwall. She has a foundation degree in Art & Design and a BA (Hons) in Contemporary Crafts from University College Falmouth.
Zenna creates ceramic sculptures using porcelain clay, a material associated with Cornwall's china clay country. She incorporates found objects such as old wood and vegetation into her pieces. The characters depicted in her artworks are inspired by the Cornish myths and stories told to her by her parents.
Her work has been widely exhibited throughout Cornwall.
Born in Fifield, Oxfordshire, the son of a clergyman of Cornish stock, Talmage studied at the Herkomer School, Bushey at the same time as Lucy Elizabeth KEMP-WELCH. He came first to Cornwall with his friend, Greville MORRIS, also a St Ives student, and in meeting Arnesby BROWN decided to stay (The Artist, Oct 1932 quote). Within Cornwall he lived variously at St Ives, Redruth and Tintagel.
At the 1895 Opening of NAG, he exhibited Moonrise in January which was reviewed as 'one of the finest landscapes in the Show'. Helped to run the painting school at St Ives with Julius OLSSON. Later he began and ran his own school with the help of his wife Gertrude ROWE, also an artist, with OLSSON acting as 'Visitor' artist.
Talmage excelled in demonstrating the art of oil colour impressions drawn loosely with the brush. His relaxed teaching manner with the emphasis on outdoor sketching - combined with once a year trips to Picardy - made him extremely popular among students.
Charles MARRIOTT echoes this reputation in the Cornish Review (1950): 'One of the most talented and certainly the most popular of the St Ives' painters was Algernon Talmage, a most attractive personality; modest, slightly reserved but always ready to do a kind action for a friend. His right hand had been injured in a gun accident -- he was rather sensitive about this-- and he painted with his left, as did, incidentally, Stanhope FORBES.'
He left St Ives in about 1907 (address at London Arts Club from 1910), having parted from Gertrude, on the strength of some successes with his work in London. In 1918 he was appointed official war artist in France for the Canadian Government. Up until the 1920s he returned frequently to Cornwall, continuing an interest in STISA from afar. He contributed paintings to a St Ives show in Cheltenham and then accepted Hon membership in 1928. With him in London was Hilda FEARON until her early death.
Born in Redruth, Cornwall, the artist daughter of Sampson T and Fanny Rowe, and the older sister of Louisa C G ROWE, Gertrude exhibited two paintings at the RBA in 1895-6 in the family name. She married the artist Algernon Mayow TALMAGE in 1896, with whom she helped run his school of painting. In 1901 the couple, with their two children, were living with Gertrude's parents in St Ives. They parted after Talmage left for London in 1907.
In 1914 and 1917 she exhibited at the RA. As Annie C G Talmage, she died in Falmouth in 1941, aged 74.
2014: Researcher Christopher Garrett is currently endeavouring to ascertain further information regarding the children of Algernon Talmage and Gertrude Rowe.
Born on 10 October 1857 in Bristol (GRO), one of nine children, Arthur attended a Quaker School at Weston-super-Mare, where he became friends with, amongst others, Henry Scott TUKE (aka 'Harry'). By the time he was in London with the idea of a business career, Tuke was also in London, entering the Slade to begin formal art training. They travelled abroad together with other friends, notably the Gotches, and Tanner decided also to become an artist.
A bachelor, reputedly with a private income, he was one of the first artists to settle in West Cornwall, where he lived initially at Cappy cottage, Lamorna, and abroad when funds were low. In the summer of 1887 he is described by Lomax as the protégé of Phil Whiting, camping out with him and Tuke, walking and sailing in his boat. A photograph from the Birch family album is included in Lomax (p86). In 1889 he spent time abroad in France, studying at Julian's Academie in Paris.
In the early 1900s, Tanner and Tuke became regular companions of Birch - indeed Tanner was best man at Birch's wedding in 1902. The 1901 census notes him living at 'Vellensagia', near Lamorna. At the time of the 1911 census he was staying at Cliff House Hotel in Lamorna. Until his death he remained one of Tuke's closest friends and an active member of the Lamorna and Newlyn communities. Tanner died on 6 April, 1916, age 58, at Bristol (GRO). At the time of his death he was described as being 'of Lamorna'.
Steve completed a Fine Art Photography degree in 1988, and has worked steadily on commissions relating to books, catalogues, artistic events in the area and internationally since that time. Awards and bursaries have helped him to develop work from places in Europe, Northern Ireland, Africa, the Russias, and to show these in numerous exhibitions in the locale and abroad. In 1995 the Falmouth Art Gallery gave him a solo show, after his European tour with Kneehigh Theatre in 1994 (South West Arts Award).
He has taught at both Falmouth College of Arts and Penwith College part-time, and expanded his repertoire into film-making (Brainstorm Films) as well as free-lance photography. He was in receipt of a Millennium Festival Award for a short drama 'Field of Fish' from which his exhibition piece at Falmouth Art Gallery in 2000 was taken. For the number of years that it took to gather, collate and publish the superb volume, Cornwall & Isles of Scilly: Oil Paintings in Public Ownership, Steve Tanner was the photographer for this massive project (published 2007).
Carol Tanner is a sculptor and painter whose latest work combines the themes of dance and euphoria.
Chris Tate graduated from Falmouth School of Art in 2004, with an honours degree in Illustration. His paintings reflect his interest in architecture and the built environment. His work has been exhibited widely in Cornwall and beyond.
Born in Leytonstone, London on 5 April, 1862 (GRO), the son of a lawyer, William M Tayler and his wife Sarah, he studied at Heatherleys, the RA schools and at the Slade where he met Thomas Cooper GOTCH, and then also at Laurens Atelier in Paris. Another close friend, made in Paris, was Norman GARSTIN.
He lived for 12 years in Newlyn, after arriving first in 1884. (The Centre for Whistler Studies, holding a biography for Tayler, incorrectly states that he spent two years only in Cornwall before settling permanently in London. In fact, he lived successively at Belle Vue House, the Malt House with the Gotches, and later at Park Terrace).
He served on the provisional committee of artists when NAG opened on 22 October 1895, but moved soon after to settle in Kensington, London. Despite non-residence in Cornwall, he continued to show and sell paintings at NAG. In 1896 he married Mrs Elizabeth Cotes, the daughter of a surgeon to the Royal Household, who had one daughter by her first marriage. Together the couple had two sons, both of whom were killed in WWI.
His sister, Mary Beatrice Churchill Tayler (1869-c1939), moved to Cornwall in 1921, and became the resident Assistant Honorary Secretary of NAG and the NSA, with her friend Miss Hall acting as Custodian. Reginald DICK had taken over as Temporary Hon Sec when Henry RHEAM had died in post, and the two women were to rescue the Gallery from the lack of administrative control and direction which occurred. Miss Churchill Tayler remained in post until 1934, when she joined the NAG Committee, and was made an Honorary Life Member. Hence the connections between the Tayler family and Newlyn were to span a period of some 55 years.
His subjects were interiors, dinner parties and other domestic celebrations, later concentrating on religious subjects. He died on 20 December, 1925 in London.
A full page reproduction of his painting Feeding Time (detail), in the possession of Penlee House Museum, Penzance, is reprinted in PCF (2007).
[Photo likeness in Hardie 2009 with Henry Scott TUKE.]
Born on 26 July 1843, London, the son of the artist, Frederick TAYLER RWS, Norman studied at the RA Schools and in Rome. He began exhibiting in 1863, largely with the OWS (90 works), but also at the RA and others.
He was a Newlyn resident by 1883, and shared a house with Newlyn visitor Harry TUCK, a few doors away from fellow artists John Robertson REID and his sister, Flora MacDonald REID.
Based in Mylor Bridge, Di Taylor makes stoneware and also raku fired pieces.
Taylor came to St Ives in 1989, and some ten years later earned a degree in Fine Art at Falmouth College of Art. She was born in Manchester and lived previously in London where she raised her four children.
In Cornwall she has worked with the PALP (Penwith Artist-Led Projects) group on installations, and contributed to other exhibitions in Newlyn, St Ives and Penzance (Rainyday Gallery).
She works from Porthmeor Studios in St Ives.
Peter Taylor was born in Clitheroe, Lancashire. He is very well known in his native county and spends a great deal of time painting in Cornwall, particuarly around St Ives Bay, generally between Hayle and Portreath.
Steve Taylor is a local artist and member of Lands End School of Art. He has become involved in many local community projects and more recently has become an art teacher.
Lauren Adele Taylor was born in Polzeath. She is mainly self-taught, though she has studied at Truro & Penwith College, and at the Cornwall Art Studio. Her work aims to convey emotion and memory.
Carrie Taylor studied at Harrogate College of Art and Bradford Art College and was also taught by Jean Georges Simon - a Hungarian artist who had been a close friend of Bourdelle and Modigliani - who became an important influence on her work. She lives in St Just-in-Penwith, where her lifelong fascination for natural history is expressed in paintings recording her observations of hedgerows, moorland, water and rocks throughout the seasons. 'Each turn in a track or a lane reveals an intricate network of leaves and branches and each rock-hollow on the seashore, a secret world of reflections, pebbles and seaweed.'
Her work is exhibited widely throughout Cornwall and beyond.