Spiral Movement 1951

Spiral Movement 1951
Mary Martin 1907-1969
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ARTIST BIOGRAPHY

Mary Martin 1907-1969

Born in Folkstone, Mary Martin Studied at Goldsmith College in 1925 - 29 followed by the Royal College of Art from 1929 to 32, ,marrying Kenneth Martin 1930. Much of their exhibition history and biography is the same as they had such a close working relationship. Having exhibited at the A.I.A from 1934 onwards under her maiden name of Balmford mainly as a landscape and still life painter, like Kenneth Martin, her work evolved towards the abstract style as a result of exhibiting with the London Group from 1932 and becoming a member of the group in 1959. During this time she also taught at Chelmsford School of Art from 1941 - 44.

Mary painted her first abstract picture in 1950, and made her first reliefs in 1951. Her first one-man exhibition was with her husband, at the Heffer Gallery, Cambridge in 1954. She made her first free-standing construction in 1956. Despite becoming an abstract artist at the same time as Kenneth Martin, Mary Martin was less well represented in the early years and her early figurative work is less well known although she exhibited her first abstract works with Kenneth in the Gimpel Fils exhibition Design in February 1951.

She used permutations determined by mathematical principles such as the Golden Section and the Fibonacci sequence. Her reliefs are built up using modern sheet material, from a base plane, which allows the works, when placed against the wall, to become part of the architectural environment. She developed spiral movement in later reliefs. A major retrospective of her work was held at the Tate Gallery, London in 1984