Monday, May 02, 2016

A Brief Flowering

For the first time I'm joining in with Barbara at Coastal Ripples for her Paint Monthly  link up.

On a recent short break in Wales we visited one of our favourite places Llanbedrog which is on the Llyn Peninsular near Pwllheli.  We never tire of visiting this place and walking along the beach past the brightly coloured beach huts and I know I've taken you there in many posts over the last few years.  


Another highlight of any visit to Llanbedrog is to visit the wonderful Oriel Plas Glyn y Weddw and we've seen some wonderful exhibitions there over the years. 



 It is a beautiful place which also has an open air theatre over looking the sea and gently inclining walks up to the cliff tops and coastal walks from the grounds of the art gallery.


This year we were lucky to see three of the gallery's Spring exhibitions and I enjoyed all three but one, 'A Brief Flowering,' stood out for me and there is a rather interesting story about the artist, John Cyrlas Williams, to go with it.


Of course I couldn't take photographs so I've put in some links to other sites where you can see some of Williams's paintings most of which were on display at the gallery.


 John Cyrlas Williams was described by his patron Winifred Coombe-Tennant as 'the real thing' and he was thought of as being amongst the most talented of the Welsh painters of his generation but until recently he and his work were almost forgotten.


 John Cyrlas Williams was born in the USA, the son of a Welsh miner who had joined a Welsh mining community there.  The family moved back to Wales just before WWI and set up home in Porthcawl.  He studied at the Newlyn School under Stanhope Forbes and then the Colarossi Atelier in Paris as well as working at Port Aven in Brittany and Martigues in the south of France.  He was at the height of his powers in the 1920s but only a few years later his painting career was over deeply affected by his depressive nature and alcoholism.  He spent the rest of his life as a civil service clerk and died aged 63 in 1965.

In 2009 a collection of about a hundred of his paintings were found in the attic of the old family home and if they hadn't been spotted by a curious auctioneer they would have ended up on a bonfire when the house was cleared.  A friend of the curator of the exhibition alerted him to the sale of the paintings which have been brought together for this wonderful exhibition.

The paintings in this exhibition which I found most fascinating were two works which depicted the art classes and studios at the Newlyn School.

Here are some links to more about the artist.






22 comments:

  1. What a fabulous post Rosie, thanks for joining Paint Monthly. Clicking on the links that exhibtion area sounds fascinating. Definitely a place to head for. The artist John Williams is new to me, but I love the look of his work. What an amazing story and what a loss if his work had been burnt. I'm off to find out more about him. Thank you. B X

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    1. The gallery itself is in a wonderful building and they have so super exhibitions as well as crafts too. I'd never heard of this artist before but I was so interested when I read about him and I loved his paintings:)

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  2. What an interesting story. I didn't know anything about John Cyrlas Williams and of course it was so fortunate that the right person was there at the right time to save his work. Thanks for the links - I'll find out more about him.
    I love the idea of an open air theatre and the setting for this one does sound wonderful.

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    1. I'd love to go to a performance at the theatre on a warm, summer evening. It is a fascinating story isn't it? Thank goodness the paintings were saved and brought together again in this exhibition:)

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  3. So interesting to read more about this artist and his work. Thank you for sharing this and teaching me something new!

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    1. Glad you enjoyed reading about the artist, Amy I was thrilled to have found out about him and his work:)

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  4. I really enjoyed watching the slideshow and seeing his airy, beautifully coloured paintings. It must has been great to see them in the flesh. :-)

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    1. It was wonderful to see them on the gallery walls and I'm glad we visited when we did as the exhibition ends on 15th May:)

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  5. Wonderful. I hadn't heard of him, or this gallery, which is now on my list of places to visit. Thanks, Rosie. x

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    1. The gallery is a wonderful building inside and out and they always have super exhibitions there. The village iteslf by the beach is wonderful too. The main road splits the village in two, the touristy side is near the gallery and beach the working, everyday village on the other side of the road:)

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  6. The trouble ( or not) with reading blogs as I've found out since finishing work is my list of places to visit is growing at an alarming rate. Also I'm learning about new stuff everyday. I've never heard of this painter so thank you for introducing me to him

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    1. I know about the growing list of places to visit! I love finding new places through what people have shared on their blogs and learning new things too:)

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  7. What a marvellous place and an interesting artist!
    Thank you for sharing. I learned many new things. :)
    Have a lovely May! xx

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    1. Thanks, Sara glad you enjoyed the post. Hope you too have a lovely May:)

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  8. Looks like a beautiful place to visit..
    Amanda xx

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  9. A really interesting post - I'd never heard of the artist so thanks so much for providing the links. Thank goodness his work was found and recognised - it would have been such a tragedy if his paintings hadn't been saved.

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    1. It would have been awful if they'd been destroyed, hard to believe anyone would do that nowadays but I expect some important things are still lost:)

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  10. There's some real Newlyn School influence in his work! I've encountered a few Welsh artists during visits there but never come across Williams. Great post. Thanks.

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    1. Glad you found it interesting. We came across an artist at the gallery on Anglsey that I liked a couple of years ago. I must look him up again:)

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  11. I just saw this post Rosie. What a wonderful artist. I really love his style. So beautiful paintings in the link. Thank you so much for sharing!

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    1. Thanks, Ritta glad you enjoyed the paintings:)

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