Special Exhibition: Wilhelmina Barns-Graham
The Barns-Graham Charitable Trust
The Barn's-Graham Charitable Trust was established by Wilhelmina Barns-Graham in 1987, to secure her life's work and archive for future generations.
The Trust's Aims:
- To foster, protect and promote the reputation of Wilhelmina Barns-Graham
- To advance the knowledge of the life and work of Wilhelmina Barns-Graham through exhibitions, research and publications
- To create an archive of key works of art and papers
- To support and inspire art and art history students
Bursaries and Grants
The Trust assists financially art and art history students at Edinburgh College of Art, St Andrews University, Glasgow School of Art, Gray's School of Art in Aberdeen, Duncan of Jordanstone College of Art and Design Dundee, and University Falmouth.
This is an area of activity that the Trust is aiming to expand in the future.
The Trust also offers an annual travel scholarship to an artist early in their career, administered through Royal Scottish Academy.
Lectures and Exhibitions
The Trust sponsors an annual Barns-Graham Lecture. The second will take place in Edinburgh later this year. And to date the Trust has supported Barns-Graham
exhibitions at: The Tate, St Ives (2005); Trinity Hall, Cambridge, Sherborne House, Dorset, The Gateway Centre, St Andrews University (2007). A touring exhibition of Barns-Graham’s drawing starts at The Pier Art Centre, Stromness, Orkney, in June, 2007. The Barns-Graham Charitable Trust is registered in Scotland as a charity No. SC016854
Wilhelmina Barns-Graham
Wilhelmina Barns-Graham, born in St Andrews, Fife, 1912, was one of the central members of the St Ives Group. She moved to St Ives in 1940, after she graduated from Edinburgh College of Art in 1937. Early on she met Borlase Smart, Alfred Wallis and Bernard Leach as well as Ben Nicholson, Barbara Hepworth and Naum Gabo who were living locally at Carbis Bay. She became a member of the Newlyn Society of Artists and St Ives Society of Artists but was to leave latter in 1949 when she became a founding member of the Penwith Society of Artists. She was one of the initial exhibitors of the significant Crypt Group.
Barns-Graham exhibited consistently throughout her career, both in private and public galleries. She was widely successful throughout the 1950's. Not short of exposure in later decades she became much overshadowed by her St Ives contemporaries, until regaining great success, critically and commercially, in her last decade.. Recognition of her contribution to British modernist painting was assured with important survey shows at the Tate St Ives in 1999/2000 and 2005. In print, 2001 saw the publication of Lynne Green's monograph W. Barns-Graham - a studio life, follwed in 2007 by The Prints of Wilhelmina Barns-Graham.
A Complete Catalogue by Ann Gunn
She was made CBE in 2001, and received four honorary doctorates (St Andrews 1992, Plymouth 2000, Exeter 2001 and Heriot Watt Universities 2003). Her work is found in all major public collections within the UK.
Balmungo
In 1960 Barns-Graham inherited a family home, Balmungo, near St Andrews. The house lay at the heart of her business and will continue in the future to be the base for her charitable trust.
Balmungo is currently undergoing a major refurbishment, to open in 2010. The centre will provide public access to the life and work of Wilhelmina Barns-Graham with art, archive and library.
Wilhelmina Barns-Graham bequeathed to the Trust a collection of paintings, drawings and prints. The collection gives a unique opportunity for students and art historians to develop a full understanding of the evolution of her art.
It is intended to develop a programme for artists in residence to keep Balmungo as a place of creativity.
