ADRIAN RYAN (BRITISH 1920-1988) §
UNTITLED (BEACH SCENE)
£375
Auction: 16 April 2020 at 12:00 BST
Description
Signed, oil on board
Dimensions
14cm x 20.5cm (5.5in x 8in)
Footnote
Biography:
Adrian Ryan joined the Slade School of Art during it’s wartime evacuation to Oxford. Excused military service on medical grounds he shared a studio with Augustus John’s son Edwin and became friendly with the artist Matthew Smith. In 1943 he held his first exhibition at the Redfern Gallery where the painter Edward Le Bas was one of the first to buy a painting. Ryan inherited sufficient money from his grandfather to build an impressive collection of predominantly French artists such as Bonnard, Modigliani, Utrillo and Soutine although they subsequently had to be sold due to his brother’s unwise business ventures. From 1948 he taught first at Goldsmiths and subsequently at Cambridge College of Art. Ryan also spent two lengthy periods living and working in Mousehole in Cornwall and although he knew many of the artists associated with the St. Ives school such as Lanyon and Heron he was never interested in abstraction. Landscapes and still lives were his chosen subject matter and he showed regularly at the Royal Academy Summer Exhibitions.