Anthony Fry, 1927-2016 Alan Payne July 2026
Anthony Fry at work in his studio (courtesy Anthony Fry Retrospective - The Holburne Museum, 2018)
We went to an exhibition of Roger Fry at the wonderful Somerset Museum recently and were reminded of his cousin Anthony Fry who lived at Longridge House, Middle Hill, Box. He too was an artist of considerable renown, although little-known in the Box community.
Personal Life
Anthony Lewis Matthew Fry was born in Essex in 1927, the son of Dr Lewis Salisbury Fry, who was related to the Quaker, chocolate-manufacturing family, JS Fry and Sons of Bristol. Anthony had numerous art connections, through his cousin Roger Fry and great aunt Marjorie, who together introduced Anthony to the Bloomsbury Group of London intellectuals including Virginia Woolf, Maynard Keynes and EM Foster. Anthony was also cousin to Sir Howard Hodgkin, the outstanding British painter and printmaker.
Anthony bought Longridge House in the 1950s, while teaching at Bath Academy of Art at Corsham Court. The house is late 18th century, apparently built as accommodation for the Spa Mineral Water venture which never really got off the ground. The house is deep in the Middlehill hamlet and ideal for Anthony, who was rarely seen in the village. He married twice – in 1951 to Barbara Harris, who died in 1968, and in 1982 to Sabrina Carver, who died in 2013. He had four children. Visitors to the house were reputed to include Princess Margaret, who became something of a patron.
Influences in his Work
The Holburne Museum of Art, Bath, was the first to put on a retrospective exhibition of Anthony’s work in 2018. They described the exhibition as: Fry’s principal inspiration was travel. His early work, dominated by dancing figures, reflects the landscape of Tuscany. From the late 1980s, his painting is characterised by strong, intense colour, influenced by time spent in the sparse and sunny spaces of southern India, Morocco and the Sahara Desert, and Andalucía. The critic John Berger recognised Fry’s paintings as being essentially depictions of heat – evocations of a certain climate and culture.[1]
Anthony’s time abroad was extensive: 1950-52 scholarship at the British School at Rome; 1961-63 fellowships in the USA; in the 1970s and 80s travelling in Malta, Spain and Morocco at a time when released from teaching at the Chelsea School of Art; and for twelve years after 1994 six months a year in south-west India at Fort Cochin, Kerala.
Work from Anthony Fry’s early period. Left: Dancers and Right: Five Figures (courtesy https/www.invaluable.comauction-lotanthony-fry-1927-2016)
Anthony Fry’s Work
Anthony’s paintings divide into three different periods, before 1970; during the 1970s; later work.
Anthony Fry experimented with different mediums: oil, watercolour, gouache, fresco on canvas, dry powder and mixed media. The human subjects in his work are often simple figures, an excuse to explore the ranges and distinctions of colour, and what happens to colour in different conditions of light.[3] Fry did not seek to depict reality in his work, either of locations or of people.
Left: Reclining Woman in an Interior and Right: Yellow Room (courtesy https/www.invaluable.comauction-lotanthony-fry-1927-2016)
Fry’s work is uplifting, colourful and often dreamlike. Based on his memories of people and places, his view of the world depicted hope in humanity, not a representation of reality. They are an ideal antidote to the stresses of one’s actual, mundane existence. Bryan Robertson of the Whitechapel Art Gallery described Fry as ‘a richly sensual fantasist’. Perhaps for that reason he has had regular exhibitions in London since his death.
Conclusion
Anthony Fry’s work has been recognised internationally and is shown in prestigious private collections, including the Tate, Arts Council of Great Britain, Saatchi Collection and the Gulbenkian Foundation Collection and the Gulbenkian Foundation Collection. In an essay entitled 'A Certain Tradition of Heat', John Berger wrote: "Fry's pictures – like all good visual art – defy words. With words we cannot get nearer to them than a map can get to a landscape. We can enter them only with our eyes’. In a series of interviews John Russell added, 'One of the most individual achievements of British painting... Almost alone among the English painters of his generation, Fry reasserts the prestige of the dreamer'.[4]
Bibliography
'Anthony Fry', Published by Umbrage Editions New York, 2001. ISBN 1-884167-06-3. Includes essays on Fry by John Berger, Tom Stoppard, Andrew Lambirth, Bloomsbury Set member Frances Partridge, Bryan Roberston and Cathy Courtney.
'Anthony Fry, Paintings and Works on Paper 2000–2011', Published by Umbrage Editions New York, 2011. ISBN 978-1-884167-140. Foreword by Patrick Kinmonth.
Anthony Fry at work in his studio (courtesy Anthony Fry Retrospective - The Holburne Museum, 2018)
We went to an exhibition of Roger Fry at the wonderful Somerset Museum recently and were reminded of his cousin Anthony Fry who lived at Longridge House, Middle Hill, Box. He too was an artist of considerable renown, although little-known in the Box community.
Personal Life
Anthony Lewis Matthew Fry was born in Essex in 1927, the son of Dr Lewis Salisbury Fry, who was related to the Quaker, chocolate-manufacturing family, JS Fry and Sons of Bristol. Anthony had numerous art connections, through his cousin Roger Fry and great aunt Marjorie, who together introduced Anthony to the Bloomsbury Group of London intellectuals including Virginia Woolf, Maynard Keynes and EM Foster. Anthony was also cousin to Sir Howard Hodgkin, the outstanding British painter and printmaker.
Anthony bought Longridge House in the 1950s, while teaching at Bath Academy of Art at Corsham Court. The house is late 18th century, apparently built as accommodation for the Spa Mineral Water venture which never really got off the ground. The house is deep in the Middlehill hamlet and ideal for Anthony, who was rarely seen in the village. He married twice – in 1951 to Barbara Harris, who died in 1968, and in 1982 to Sabrina Carver, who died in 2013. He had four children. Visitors to the house were reputed to include Princess Margaret, who became something of a patron.
Influences in his Work
The Holburne Museum of Art, Bath, was the first to put on a retrospective exhibition of Anthony’s work in 2018. They described the exhibition as: Fry’s principal inspiration was travel. His early work, dominated by dancing figures, reflects the landscape of Tuscany. From the late 1980s, his painting is characterised by strong, intense colour, influenced by time spent in the sparse and sunny spaces of southern India, Morocco and the Sahara Desert, and Andalucía. The critic John Berger recognised Fry’s paintings as being essentially depictions of heat – evocations of a certain climate and culture.[1]
Anthony’s time abroad was extensive: 1950-52 scholarship at the British School at Rome; 1961-63 fellowships in the USA; in the 1970s and 80s travelling in Malta, Spain and Morocco at a time when released from teaching at the Chelsea School of Art; and for twelve years after 1994 six months a year in south-west India at Fort Cochin, Kerala.
Work from Anthony Fry’s early period. Left: Dancers and Right: Five Figures (courtesy https/www.invaluable.comauction-lotanthony-fry-1927-2016)
Anthony Fry’s Work
Anthony’s paintings divide into three different periods, before 1970; during the 1970s; later work.
- The early period was described by Chris Stevens at the Holburne Retrospective as:
- Following the death of his first wife, Anthony produced very little in the early 1970s.
- His work in the 1980s and thereafter was prolific, seduced into intense colour by the experience of living in the heat in Greece, India, Italy, the Sahara and Andalucia. It encouraged him to find ever more direct ways of rendering colour.[2]
Anthony Fry experimented with different mediums: oil, watercolour, gouache, fresco on canvas, dry powder and mixed media. The human subjects in his work are often simple figures, an excuse to explore the ranges and distinctions of colour, and what happens to colour in different conditions of light.[3] Fry did not seek to depict reality in his work, either of locations or of people.
Left: Reclining Woman in an Interior and Right: Yellow Room (courtesy https/www.invaluable.comauction-lotanthony-fry-1927-2016)
Fry’s work is uplifting, colourful and often dreamlike. Based on his memories of people and places, his view of the world depicted hope in humanity, not a representation of reality. They are an ideal antidote to the stresses of one’s actual, mundane existence. Bryan Robertson of the Whitechapel Art Gallery described Fry as ‘a richly sensual fantasist’. Perhaps for that reason he has had regular exhibitions in London since his death.
Conclusion
Anthony Fry’s work has been recognised internationally and is shown in prestigious private collections, including the Tate, Arts Council of Great Britain, Saatchi Collection and the Gulbenkian Foundation Collection and the Gulbenkian Foundation Collection. In an essay entitled 'A Certain Tradition of Heat', John Berger wrote: "Fry's pictures – like all good visual art – defy words. With words we cannot get nearer to them than a map can get to a landscape. We can enter them only with our eyes’. In a series of interviews John Russell added, 'One of the most individual achievements of British painting... Almost alone among the English painters of his generation, Fry reasserts the prestige of the dreamer'.[4]
Bibliography
'Anthony Fry', Published by Umbrage Editions New York, 2001. ISBN 1-884167-06-3. Includes essays on Fry by John Berger, Tom Stoppard, Andrew Lambirth, Bloomsbury Set member Frances Partridge, Bryan Roberston and Cathy Courtney.
'Anthony Fry, Paintings and Works on Paper 2000–2011', Published by Umbrage Editions New York, 2011. ISBN 978-1-884167-140. Foreword by Patrick Kinmonth.
References
[1] Chris Stevens, Anthony Fry A Retrospective - The Holburne Museum, 2018
[2] Philip Hensher for Event Magazine, Anthony Fry: A Retrospective - review | Daily Mail Online, 2018
[3] Philip Hensher for Event Magazine, Anthony Fry: A Retrospective - review | Daily Mail Online, 2018
[4] Anthony Fry, John Berger, Cathy Courtney, Anthony Fry, Umbrage Editions New York, 2001
[1] Chris Stevens, Anthony Fry A Retrospective - The Holburne Museum, 2018
[2] Philip Hensher for Event Magazine, Anthony Fry: A Retrospective - review | Daily Mail Online, 2018
[3] Philip Hensher for Event Magazine, Anthony Fry: A Retrospective - review | Daily Mail Online, 2018
[4] Anthony Fry, John Berger, Cathy Courtney, Anthony Fry, Umbrage Editions New York, 2001