Trevor Bell (English, 1930-2017)

The vibrant abstract paintings and drawings of Trevor Bell, who has died aged 87, helped define the modern art of the community of St Ives.

Mike Tooby, Trevor Bell Obituary in The Guardian, 10 Nov 2017.  

Trevor Bell was born in Leeds and gained a scholarship to Leeds College of Art, graduating in 1952. Terry Frost encouraged Bell to move to St Ives to focus on painting. Upon moving there in 1955, Trevor Bell soon met the vibrant community of artists that lived and worked on the distant peninsula of Cornwall. Bell quickly gained recognition and encouragement from the St Ives artists, in the catalogue for his first solo show at Waddington Galleries, London, Patrick Heron described Bell as ‘the best non-figurative painter under thirty’. In 1960 Trevor Bell returned to Leeds as a Gregory Fellow at the university, allowing him time to work and solidify his creative lineage. 

In the 1960s Bell continued to teach and exhibit in the UK but also spent time in the US, his style began to diverge from that of the St Ives artists as he focused on vibrant colours and began using shaped canvases. Appointed as a professor at Florida State University, Bell moved to the US in 1976 and stayed there for 20 years. Set up in a big warehouse studio, Bell worked on large-scale works, shaped canvases and murals commissioned for public locations. 

In 1996 Bell retired from his post at Florida State University and moved back to Cornwall. He gained renewed recognition with the revival of interest in British Modernism and was included in the opening displays at Tate St Ives in 1993. While making and exhibiting works in the UK, Trevor Bell still benefitted from the support of his colleagues in the US.