Public Hanging

Anthony Fagin, 31 January 2023

And while they might grudgingly concede to being elderly, they would emphatically reject being called gentlemen. However on this, as on practically all matters, they do not speak with one voice. Some would dispute being called elderly; others would claim that they really are gentlemen.

The first Public Hanging took place in 1981 in the Penwith Gallery, St Ives. After a wait of 37 years, there was a second Public Hanging also at the Penwith in 2018, and a third in the following year, 2019, at the Heritage Courtyard Gallery in Wells. With a combined time on the planet totalling nearly half a millennium – 446 years – you’d think that these six artists might now begin to ease up. Not a bit of it! The current exhibition marks the fourth Public Hanging, some 42 years after the first, with the same personnel. It takes place in Louise Jones’ fabulous Lemon Street Gallery-Withiel Sculpture Garden, one of Cornwall’s finest independent venues comprising gallery, sculpture garden and multi-disciplinary craft centre.

The six artists (left-to-right) are Nick Hellyer, Anthony Frost, Bob Morley, David Kemp, Jason Wason and Rod Walker.  It is easier to say what they are not than what they are.  They are not a cohesive group, school, or movement.   The work that each creates is individualistic, and has little, if anything, in common with that of the others.  They are a disparate band of brothers who have lived geographically close to one another for most of their adult lives.  Each is fiercely independent, following his own artistic path.  They do not share an artistic vision or even have a common approach to the marketing of their output.  They are simply buddies who revel in one another’s company and love getting together to raise hell.

All seem to agree on one fundamental point: the vital importance of the environment in which they have chosen to live as the principal influence on their work. The remote parts of West Penwith are challenging, particularly in the depths of winter, when the raging sea, the howling wind and the unforgiving granite terrain, constantly impose themselves on the consciousness.  These six artists, whether their chosen medium is painting, sculpture or ceramics, all acknowledge the central significance of the environment   There are other shared influences too, such as their appreciation of music and living at the edge of the world among ancient stone monuments reaching back to the Neolithic, that unite these artists with one another and with the people who occupied this land in the distant past.

Nick Hellyer    Born in Cornwall, Nick Hellyer spent part of his childhood in New Zealand.  He subsequently lived in London and worked in the art department of an advertising agency.  After spending a holiday in St Ives in the mid-1970s, he and his late wife decided to move to Cornwall permanently.  His interests span painting, photography, fashion and architecture, but his objective was always to become a full-time painter.  They bought a cottage and to service the mortgage, he got a job in a printing works in Hayle.  But the work was uncongenial so he moved into construction, building and renovating barns and old buildings.  Like many other artists, he and his wife, a retired art lecturer, supplemented their income with seasonal work, principally flower picking. His great good fortune was to meet other local artists – who are now his close friends and co-exhibitors – at The Star, a local pub in St Just. His abstract paintings are characterised by solid blocks of colour and have been part of Public Hanging since the beginning.

Anthony Frost    Celebrated for his abstract works consisting of brightly coloured prints and collages, Anthony Frost’s paintings include repeated motifs (lines, triangles and dots) and a mix of materials (acrylic, hessian, sail cloth, string and any other materials that come to hand).  The son of Sir Terry Frost he was born in St Ives, Cornwall into an artistic family.  The tradition continues into a third generation with his son Luke, an established abstract artist.  Anthony Frost studied at the Cardiff College of Art where he took a BA (Hons) degree in Fine Art in 1973.  Since graduating, he has lived and worked deep in the rural landscape of West Penwith near Morvah on the Atlantic coast.  Along with the landscape, music has always played an important part in his creativity.  His personal artistic language is influenced by the music he listens to in his studio.  In fact he claims to be inspired more by musicians than by other artists. 

Bob Morley    While still a student at the West of England College of Art, Bob Morley, a Bristolian, sold some of his paintings in the Royal West of England Academy and other galleries.  He moved to Cornwall in 1973 where he took up fishing and other seasonal work but kept up with his painting.  A solo show at the Orion Gallery, Newlyn led to an appearance on the ITV ‘Aquarius’ arts programme.  He disliked the attendant public recognition, preferring to continue life as a ‘secret observer’.  He exhibited in the Newlyn and other galleries. During Expo 2005, he was involved in a collaborative project for a ceramic sculpture at Chukyo University, Japan.  A musician as well as a painter and a ceramicist, he was the bass player and a founder member of the Afro-Cornish dub rock band ‘Zambula’ formed by Titus Mwange Sembatiya a Ugandan refugee. He played bass for the Clive Palmer Band from 2010 to 2014 and was also part of a group of artists, actors, writers and musicians who took over the ailing West Cornwall Arts Centre in Penzance, re-naming it The Acorn Theatre.

David Kemp    David Kemp’s work is serious fun. To construct his acclaimed sculptural assemblages, he uses discarded objects and materials. The resulting creations bear little relation to their original constituents but frequently offer a wry comment on the way we choose to live our lives, particularly the excessive consumerism of contemporary life.  As an art student at Wimbledon College during the dustmen’s strike of 1969 he and his girlfriend grew disillusioned with urban life and moved to Cornwall to manage a herb farm at Praze-an-Beeble.   Previously he had served in the merchant navy for five years.  To bolster his earnings, he created and sold ‘antique’ seamen’s chests which had become fashionable objects of desire. Rose Hilton encouraged him to take his painting seriously and provided him with inspiration, contacts and opportunities to exhibit.  He continues to paint but is chiefly known as a sculptor whose works range in scale from the monumental to the domestic and are exhibited both in the landscape and in museums.

Jason Wason    The son of a timber importer, Jason Wason spent a lot of time during his early years with his father down at the Liverpool docks watching the huge ships being offloaded of their exotic cargoes.  He became intoxicated by the idea of one day being able to explore other cultures.  He took off as soon as he could and spent 10 years travelling widely in Europe, North Africa, the Middle East and Asia.  On returning to the UK he set up a 30-acre self-sufficient crafts community in the hills of Dumfriesshire, Scotland, where he built himself a potter’s wheel from bits and pieces and taught himself to throw.  He moved down to Cornwall in 1976 and got a job as a production potter at the Leach Pottery in St Ives where he developed his eye and acquired the disciplines of his craft.  For over 40 years now, he has lived and worked as an independent ceramicist near St Just in West Penwith.  His works are unique and highly regarded – distinctive in form with a strong sculptural presence and delicate articulation.

Rod Walker    Rod Walker dropped out of art school in Epsom and went travelling with Jason Wason, getting by on savings from previous temporary work.  On their return they joined an artists’ commune in Suffolk, working half days on antique restoration and the rest of the time on their own creative projects.  In 1971 he moved down to Cornwall and found himself among a community of established artists, rich in personality.  Rose Hilton introduced him to the vibrant art scene of Penwith.  Roger Hilton’s “abstraction-into-figuration” style greatly influenced his own work which is essentially figurative but instead of reproducing reality is an attempt to establish a relationship with it. To earn his keep he spent a year underground at the Geevor Tin Mine and then crewed on fishing boats working out of Newlyn.  All the time he kept on practising his painting.  With his Indian wife he travelled widely in India, Thailand and Nepal. The intense heat and vivid colours of the East continue to inform his work today, just as much as the Cornish environment, both physical and social, does.