John Wells

John Wells (1907–2000) was an important British painter and maker of relief constructions whose work occupies a central place in the history of post-war St Ives. Closely associated with Ben Nicholson, Barbara Hepworth, Naum Gabo and Peter Lanyon, he developed a refined abstract language in which geometry, natural forms and the rhythms of the Cornish landscape were held in delicate balance.

Born in London, Wells initially trained as a doctor at University College Hospital, while attending evening classes at St Martin’s School of Art. During a visit to Cornwall in 1928 he met Ben and Winifred Nicholson and Christopher Wood, and remained in contact with Nicholson throughout the following decade.

From 1936 to 1945 Wells worked as a general practitioner in the Isles of Scilly. During the war he made occasional visits to St Ives, where he renewed his friendship with Nicholson and met Barbara Hepworth and Naum Gabo. Gabo in particular became a profound influence, encouraging Wells towards a more constructive and abstract approach to form.

At the end of the war Wells gave up medicine to become a full-time artist and settled in Newlyn. He quickly became an important figure within the emerging St Ives group. In 1946 he was a founder member of the Crypt Group and in 1949 became a founder member of the Penwith Society of Arts. He also worked briefly as an assistant to Barbara Hepworth in 1950–51.

Wells’s paintings and constructions drew upon the visual world of west Cornwall without simply describing it. The rigging of boats, the flight of birds, clouds, sea and coastline could all provide starting points, but these observations were increasingly transformed into compositions of circles, lines, planes and carefully balanced colour. His work retained a strong connection to nature while reflecting the influence of Constructivism and the geometry of Nicholson and Gabo.

His work was exhibited widely in Britain and abroad during the post-war period. Wells showed at the Salon des Réalités Nouvelles in Paris in 1949, the São Paulo Biennale in 1951 and at the Durlacher Gallery, New York, in 1952, 1958 and 1960. In 1958 he received the Art Critics’ Prize in the British section of the International Association of Art Critics.

Although Wells withdrew increasingly from the London art world during the 1960s, he continued to work with great concentration in Newlyn. His later paintings, drawings and reliefs became more spare and meditative, pursuing an increasingly personal form of abstraction. Interest in his work revived strongly during the later twentieth century. He was represented by seven works in Tate’s major 1985 exhibition St Ives 1939–64, and Tate St Ives mounted the retrospective John Wells: The Fragile Cell in 1998.

Wells’s work is held in major public collections including Tate and the National Galleries of Scotland. His legacy is also preserved through the Borlase Smart John Wells Trust, established after his death to maintain his former studios in Newlyn as a centre for artists.