Image: Lawrence Atkinson (1873-1931) Vorticist Composition, c. 1913/14
The Court Gallery is showing 'Mapping the Abstract 1914-2014', a survey of a century of abstraction that runs from 21 July to 5 September 2026. The exhibition was flagged in the gallery's newsletter under the heading 'Two exhibitions now on view', where it appeared alongside a concurrent 'August Selection of Modern British & French Art'.
Thirty works are listed on the exhibition page, and they move from the Vorticist and Constructivist beginnings of British abstraction towards its later twentieth-century forms. The earliest is Lawrence Atkinson's 'Vorticist Composition' of about 1913/14; the latest dated piece is George Dannatt's 'Legend' of 2008. Painting, drawing, collage and relief are all represented.
British mid-century abstraction dominates the selection: Robert Adams, Adrian Heath, Vera Spencer, Mary Kessell, Bernard Carter, Kenneth Lauder, Trevor Bell, Peter Kinley, Mary Potter, Jean Spencer, John Henry Norman, Edward Wolfe, Margaret Geddes, Jack Hellewell, Roger Large, Roy Walker and John Wealthy all appear, and Denis Mitchell is shown with three small compositions of about 1955. A French and Continental strand runs through Sonia Delaunay, Max Papart, René Audêbès, Albert Chubac, Lucienne Olivieri and Frédéric Belser, while the Dutch painter Jan Schreuder and the Irish artist Tony O'Malley extend the survey beyond Britain and France.
The Court Gallery was founded in 1990 by John Wilcox and deals in Modern British and Modern French art, with a stated interest in twentieth-century modernism, Cubism and abstraction. It operates by appointment, with viewings arranged either at West Quantoxhead in Somerset or in St James's, London. A third exhibition, devoted to Moelwyn Merchant (1913-1997), is listed on the gallery's site as coming soon.
