Join us for the exhibition of paintings by St Ives artist Morwenna Thistlethwaite (1912-2000).
Morwenna Thistlethwaite, who spent much of her working life in St Ives, painted still-lives, interiors and genre scenes imbued with a hazy, dreamlike quality. This exhibition shines the light on a quiet talent whose work deserves to be better known. Sacha Llewellyn, 2022.
Thistlethwaite was born in July 1912, in Kew, near Richmond, Surrey. At 14, while living in the north of Scotland, she apparently met Borlase Smart, who alongside Julius Olsson had been one of the original painters of the St Ives School. Smart suggested Morwenna travel to St Ives to study at the school set up by Leonard Fuller, but instead from 1938 she studied, for two years, as a mature student, at Leamington Spa Art College. Thistlethwaite then spent 4 years at Birmingham College of Art during the war.