This website uses cookies so that we can provide you with the best user experience possible. Cookie information is stored in your browser and performs functions such as recognising you when you return to our website and helping our team to understand which sections of the website you find most interesting and useful.
St Ives Past & Present
Experience the history of the St Ives art scene through this collection of films featuring St Ives School of Painting and the importance of St Ives and Porthmeor Studios as an artists’ colony.
Since 1938.
A glimpse into St Ives and the St Ives School of Painting originally established here in 1938 by Leonard Fuller. Have fun spotting the same buildings that still surround the studios in the artistic quarter. See how little has changed!
The Renovation of Porthmeor Studios
In 2012 the £4M renovation of Porthmeor Studios was finally completed. Decades of exposure to Atlantic gales had greatly weakened the fabric of the building and it found itself on the English Heritage ‘Buildings At Risk Register. The works involved the repair and strengthening of the building, improving access and acoustic and thermal insulation.
The studios now provides high quality and essential workspace for fishermen in four cellars; for artists in fifteen studios and with two studios each for the St Ives School of Painting and the Borlase Smart John Wells Trust.
The films below give you a glimpse into the studios before they were transformed into the warm, comfortable space we occupy today.
See the studios before renovation (left) and after renovation (right)
31/1/2021
Share on
Related Stories
How to Create a Colour Beginning
As seen in… A Fresh Start JMW Turner expert Hilary Gibson reveals how ‘colour beginnings’ formed the basis of the artist’s greatest oil paintings and shows you how to create one at home. During my career as an illustrator and art tutor, JMW Turner’s draughtsmanship and ‘colour beginnings’ have been a constant joy and inspiration....
Wilhelmina Barns-Graham Trust
The Wilhelmina Barns-Graham Trust was established by Scottish artist Wilhelmina Barns-Graham in 1987. The trust aims to foster, protect and promote the reputation of Barns-Graham as well as supporting and inspiring art and art history students through the provision of bursaries and scholarships. The Artist’s Life and Legacy Wilhelmina Barns-Graham, known as Willie, was born...
The Sunday Times: The Art of Learning
As seen in… Is it a bird, is it a plane? Our budding Rothko, Sean Newsom, signs up for an abstract art class in St Ives. Can I remind you that this jumble of fisherman cottages and harbour walls was also – for a time – the forcing house of British abstract art? – When...