Work
Tunnard's early works were considered fairly conventional. His first major exhibition, held in 1932 at the Redfern Gallery, featured landscapes, marine scenes and still life. From the mid-1930s, however, he began to paint abstract works influenced by the styles of Joan Miró and Paul Klee, and further embraced British surrealism on reading Herbert Read's Surrealism. His works featured architectural and biomorphic forms combined with elements of constructivism. In his Self Portrait, now in the National Portrait Gallery (London), the artist depicts himself alongside an oversized insect.
Tunnard's work, along with that of painter Graham Sutherland, was loosely termed British Neo-romanticism, continuing the tradition of British landscape, but with a modern sensibility.
In later life he became interested in space travel and entomology, when he depicted satellites and moonscapes in his paintings.
Interest in his work diminished after his death in 1971. In 2000, there was a centenary exhibition at Durham University.
A major retrospective at Pallant House Gallery in Chichester in Spring 2010 entitled 'John Tunnard: Inner Space to Outer Space', explored the themes of abstraction, music and surrealism, nature and landscape, and science and space travel in his work. The exhibition was curated by Simon Martin.
Read more about this topic: John Tunnard
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