Image: Michael Ayrton (1921–1975), Roman Window (detail), 1950, oil on canvas. Image of courtesy of Swindon Museum and Art Gallery © Estate of Michael Ayrton

*This exhibition is now closed*

Mounted in partnership with The Ingram Collection, this exhibition celebrates the centenary of artist and polymath Michael Ayrton (1921-75), a painter, sculptor, and draughtsman whose remarkable and wide-ranging talents make him a key, but underexplored, figure in post-war British art.

Ayrton was a hugely skilled painter whose work epitomises the mid-twentieth-century world of English music and literature, whose landscapes proclaim the beauties of the English countryside, and who was obsessed with the Greek myths of Icarus and Daedalus, the Minotaur, and Demeter and Kore. The exhibition highlights how Ayrton used drawing and sculpture to bring greater conviction to his vision and will include major paintings as well as examples of his stage designs and book illustrations.

Guest curated by writer, curator, and critic Andrew Lambirth, the exhibition is drawn from public and private collections, from the artist’s estate, and from the chief seller in Ayrton’s work, Keith Chapman in Scarborough.

29 May - 8 August 2021
£7.50 Day Pass • Lightbox Members and Under 21s Free

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