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Trevor Bell

signed, dated 1958 and inscribed verso

"To Mabel & Victor for a Belief Saint Ives 1958, from Trevor"

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As the name Black & White Abstraction suggests, Bell was well informed of the Abstract Expressionist activities across the Atlantic. Using Franz Klien's monochrome palate, Bell motions his brush across the rough-hewn canvas simulating the crest-of-a-wave. Sparing in his use of oil Bell drags his unloaded brush, and leaves a good portion of the stretched support naked.

Painted three years after Bell's arrival in St Ives, this abstract composition retains something of the vitality of the sea. Reminiscent of Turner's scumbles, Bell's painterly abstraction marks him out as a landscape painter. He became an important contributor to the second generation of the St Ives School alongside peers Brian Wall and Keith Leonard, with the support of more established artists Terry Frost, Patrick Heron and Peter Lanyon.

Bell shared with other 1950s abstractionists the conviction in a, 'truth to materials,' and in the deliverance of a spiritually uplifting painting. This form of idealistic painting was critical in Britain post-war in the face of an otherwise dissolute modernity.