We're delighted to announce a major exhibition of works by Anthony Gross RA CBE (1905-1984). The show opens on Saturday 26th September and will run through the autumn.
Though the artist Anthony Gross led a life of dashing romance, his story has yet to be properly told. A new feature-length documentary and book – both produced by Goldmark, and to be jointly launched at this major exhibition, opening on Saturday 26th September – will tell how Gross honed his printmaking skills in the shanty towns of Paris; how his pioneering animations propelled him to the forefront of British film; how he became our most prolific War Artist, sketching mere metres away from enemy positions; and how, with the war behind him, he spent thirty years living and painting amid the extraordinary vistas of the Lot Valley in southern France.
Anthony Gross painting beside a lake
‘He was the Real McCoy. He was a legend. If you were interested in etching you knew about Anthony Gross.’ – Norman Ackroyd, 2024
Anthony Gross’s career was the stuff of Hollywood storytelling. Born in 1905 to a Jewish-Hungarian mapmaker and an Irish-Italian suffragette playwright, at 18 he left his training at London’s Slade School behind for a bohemian education in Paris, where he befriended fellow printmaker S.W. Hayter. Gross spent the 1920s travelling widely – from Spain, Morocco, Algeria and Tunisia to Italy, Sicily and Belgium – before meeting his wife, the fashion artist Marcelle Marguerite (Daisy) Florenty, in the Parisian suburbs. In the 1930s he jumped headlong into the world of animated film and began a celebrated career in book illustration (favourite titles included Jean Cocteau’s Les Enfants Terribles and William Golding’s Lord of the Flies).
Anthony Gross, Church over Le Boulvé, oil on canvas
Then came the outbreak of war, and the work for which Gross is today best known. After evacuating his family in 1940 on the very last boat out of Bordeaux, Gross enrolled as an Official War Artist. Between 1941 and ’46 Gross painted several hundred watercolours across international campaigns. His Lawrence of Arabia-style tours, which took him to North Africa and the Near East, to Iran and India, to the mountain ranges of Burma and across war-torn Europe, made him our most-travelled witness of the conflict. On D-Day, Gross joined Allied troops storming Gold Beach, his paints and papers held aloft as he waded ashore amid the carnage.
Anthony Gross, War Artist and Painter in Le Boulvé
A brand new 90-minute documentary from the award-winning Goldmark Films team brings Gross’s story to the screen for the very first time, with expert commentary and unmatched access to the artist’s estate and surviving family members. Joining it is an accessible and richly illustrated 108-page publication, featuring major contributions from expert art historians Julian Freeman British Art: A Walk Round the Rusty Pier) and Martin Salisbury (The Illustrated Dust Jacket: 1920-1970; Illustrator's Sketchbooks).
Together, film, book and exhibition will reveal how Gross’ work never stopped evolving, while shining light on the little-known second half of his career – when, post-war, he lived between London and the Lot Valley, retiring each summer to a dilapidated château in Le Boulvé to paint the surrounding countryside. Here, at a time when American action and colour field painting was taking the world by storm, Gross discovered a style of abstraction entirely his own, drawing on the shapes and rhythms of the natural world around him.
Anthony Gross, Reflections on Water, oil on canvas
A very special selection of these paintings, which lay hidden for over 40 years at the Gross house in Le Boulvé, will be shown to the public for the first time at this exhibition, running from Saturday 26thSeptember to 31st October. An illustrated catalogue, featuring more than 40 unseen original works by the artist, will accompany the show.
Anthony Gross’ exceptional talents, across such a wide range of media, have for too long been overlooked. This new presentation of the artist’s work will prove that here is a life story ripe for rediscovery.
Date: Saturday 26th September 2026
Time: 1pm for fizz and a light lunch.
2pm Short talk and documentary screening.
Please RSVP by email or by telephone on 01572 821 424.
Call for more details.
