Terry Frost RA (1915-2003) was a British painter and a member of the St. Ives School. Best known for his geometric abstractions formed of overlapping semi-circles, rectangles, and squares of bright colours, the artist’s work conveyed his enthusiasm for perceptual phenomena.
Frost came to art in his thirties in an unusual manner. As a commando in the Second World War he was captured by the Germans and held as a prisoner of war. Whilst in captivity in Bavaria he met the English artist Adrian Heath who encouraged him to paint. Upon his return to England, and spurred by the artistic dialogue he had had with Heath, Frost attended the Camberwell School of Art. There, he studied under the renowned painters Ben Nicholson and William Coldstream, who proved highly influential to Frost.
He later moved to Cornwall where he worked as an assistant to the sculptor Barbra Hepworth, while also having several solo exhibitions of his abstract work throughout the 1950s. Frost was joined in the town of Newlyn by Roger Hilton, with whom he began a collaboration in collage and construction techniques. Later, as his painting career progressed, he began teaching at institutions including the University of Leeds and the University of Reading.
Today, the artist’s works are in the collections of the Tate Gallery in London, the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, and the National Galleries of Scotland in Edinburgh.
