Liss Llewellyn is delighted to present our latest online exhibition: Long Live Great Bardfield.

This exhibition shines a light on the Great Bardfield group: a community of artists who lived in and around the village of Great Bardfield in North West Essex. It includes works by many of the principal figures, such as Edward Bawden, Kenneth Rowntree, Charles Mahoney, Eric Ravilious, and Tirzah Garwood. Indeed, the title of the exhibition comes from Tirzah Garwood’s autobiography, Long Live Great Bardfield, which recounts in amusing detail the activities of the group. One such anecdote explains Mahoney’s fascination with sketching sunflowers that Bawden planted by the outhouses at Brick House. Garwood recalls that Mahoney ‘made drawings from the top of a ladder, (and) one rather resented his continual presence outside the lavatory.’

This online show runs in parallel with our physical exhibition of Mahoney’s work – Charles Mahoney: The Pleasures of Life – at the Fry Art Gallery, Saffron Walden. The exhibition runs until the 27th October, 2024, and is the most significant show dedicated to the artist since a touring exhibition at The Fine Art Society in 1999 (also organised by Liss Llewellyn).