Library and Archive Reading Rooms
View by appointment- Created by
- John Banting 1902–1971
- Recipient
- John Humphrey Spender 1910–2005
- Title
- Letter from John Banting to Humphrey Spender
- Date
- 15 October [1971]
- Format
- Document - correspondence
- Collection
- Tate Archive
- Acquisition
- This collection was presented to the Tate Archive by Humphrey Spender in 1997.
- Reference
- TGA 9717/1/35
Description
In this letter, John Banting expresses a little disappointment at Spender's recent work and the character of the Rye Art Gallery where he was showing. He compares Rye, where he lived for five years, with Hastings, where he now lives, and says that the latter is 'more honestly corny'. He also makes reference to Ed Burra's recent exhibition at Lefevre gallery. Banting mentions that he too will feature as an in an exhibition at the Hamet gallery in November, remarking, 'We are just old "Period Pieces" - that is all...if Edouard Mesens were still living it would be very different'. He also says that Edward Burra and he have recently been on a trip to Dieppe, which they enjoyed, and reminds Spender that [Walter] Sickert and the Bloomsbury set both used to visit the town in the early 1900s.