Hilda Fearon
Hilda Fearon (1878–1917) was a British artist of the St Ives School. Life and Education. Hilda Fearon was born in 1878 in Banstead, Surrey, the third daughter of Paul Bradshaw Fearon, a wines and spirits merchant, and his wife Edith Jane Duffield, of Court House. She was baptised, aged 9, together with her four siblings in Swanage, Dorset, in 1888. She left Banstead to study art in Dresden (1897–99) with Robert Sterl, then at Slade (1899-1904) and with Algernon Talmage in St Ives, Cornwall; Talmage (then living apart from his wife) and she had neighbouring apartments at  Cathcart Studios, Chelsea, at the turn of the century and they later lived together although did not marry. Works and Exhibitions. Fearon began to make a name for herself as a member of the St Ives School, being one of the plein air artists whose work was exhibited at St Ives and Cheltenham in 1906 ("The End of the Evening" and "Moonlit Harbour"), and exhibited regularly from the mid-1900s onwards. Although she continued to paint land and beach/seascapes, her work quickly diversified from the typical fare associated with the St Ives School to cover a variety of subjects; she  frequently depicted figures of women and children set in interiors. Her ""arrival"" was heralded with the exhibition of "The Song", a ""small but very admirable"" portrait group, at the Royal Academy in 1909, which the critic at the "Daily News" described as ""admirable in tone, good as pattern, interesting in temper"" and remarked that Fearon ""appears... to have something to say."" Her paintings were exhibited regularly in the years leading up to her untimely death and were frequently praised by the critics. Venues at which she exhibited included the Royal Institute of Painters in Water-Colours, London, the Goupil Gallery , the New English Art Club, White City Stadium and at various provincial shows. Most significantly, she was a regular exhibitor at the Royal Academy of Arts each year ("Willows", 1908; "The Song", 1909; "The White Room" and "The Sandpit", 1910; "The Window" and "The Morning Drive", 1911; "The Ballet Master", 1912; "Midsummer", "Under the Cliffs" and "Silver and Green", 1913; "Enchantment", 1914; "The Breakfast Table" and "Nannie, Bessie and John", 1916; "The Road Across the Downs" and "Afternoon Sunshine", 1917). Final Exhibition and Death. Fearon's paintings at the 1917 RA exhibition, both figures-in-landscape paintings described by one  critic as ""things seen and felt"" ("Afternoon Sunshine" depicted two children playing with a goat in dazzling sunshine against a background of tawny rocks; "The Road Across the Downs" showed a lady in a cart, tarrying, on a white road over the downs) were said by "The Gentlewoman"'s art correspondent to be ""very delightful"" and to sustain the artist's growing reputation. Sadly, by the time the article in "The Gentlewoman" was published, Fearon was dead: she had passed away on 2 June 1917, aged 38. At the time of her death, Fearon was living with Talmage at 22  Jouberts Mansions, Jubilee Place, on the Kings Road in Chelsea. Collections. Her work is included in the collections of the Tate Gallery, London, and the Art Gallery of South Australia.