| Administrative History | Sydney Ivon Hitchens was born in 1893 in London and studied at the St John's Wood School of Art in 1911 and for four years with breaks at the Royal Academy Schools 1912-19. He also travelled during these years to Australia, New Zealand and Ceylon. Most of his work was done in oils and he specialised in rich and subtly coloured landscapes, although in the 1930s he also produced some abstract works. His style was partly influenced by Cezanne, Braque, Bonnard and Matisse. In 1919 he was one of the co-founders of the 7 & 5 Society, had his first solo show in 1925 at the Mayor Gallery and joined the London Group in 1931. After his London home was bombed in 1941 he moved to Midhurst in Sussex and used the landscape of the Downs as his subject for painting. He had a major retrospective exhibition in Leeds in 1945 and won an Arts Council award for his work for the 1951 Festival of Britain. As a result of his work for the Festival he was commissioned by the English Folk Dance and Song Society to paint the mural for their re-built headquarters. In 1956 his work was shown at the Venice Biennale. Ivon Hitchens died in 1979.
Cecil Sharp House was opened in 1930 to house the English Folk Dance and Song Society. It was damaged by bombs in 1940 and re-built in 1950. When the house was re-constructed the architect wanted to decorate one large blank wall (169 feet long). Ivon Hitchens was invited to provide a mural showing groups of dancers - a ring dance and Morris dancers on the left and a horn dance and the Padstow hobby-horse on the right. The artist eventually produced eleven large panels which were assembled on the wall and the work was unveiled on 1 July 1954. |