Frank Coombs (artist)
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Frank Mundy Coombs (30 July 1906 – 15 April 1941) was an English painter, architect and art dealer.[1]
Frank Coombs was born in Radstock, the son of Frank and Louisa Isabel Coombs, of Bath, Somerset.[2]
He studied art at King's School, Bruton under Arthur Jenkins.[1]
Career
Frank Coombs qualified as an architect and worked at the Hampshire County Council.[1] For two years, he lived in the island of Sark and there met Ala Story, while Story was on a vacation, and followed her back to London, where Story owned the Storran Gallery.[1]
Coombs was responsible for the progressive turn of the Storran Gallery.[3] Originally selling woodcuts and greeting cards, when Coombs joined the gallery in 1935 he organized his first show, a show that completely changed the future of the business.[1] After that first show, Coombs, together with Eardley Knollys and Ala Story, exhibited works by Pavel Tchelitchew, Ivon Hitchens, Frances Hodgkins, Christopher Wood and Victor Pasmore.[3][4] When Story sold her share to Knollys, Knollys and Coombs started to exhibit works by Pablo Picasso, Amedeo Modigliani, Maurice Utrillo, Glyn Philpot (Philpot painted Coombs' portrait), Claude Monet, Pierre-Auguste Renoir, Paul Gauguin, Maurice de Vlaminck, André Derain and Amedeo Modigliani.[4] Under Coombs' and Knollys' direction, the Storran Gallery became one of the most notable galleries of its time promoting Modernist art.[5][6]
Coombs was part of The London Group.[4] He was among the young artists nicknamed the Cork Street Front, and exhibited with them in 1940 at the Special War-time Show hosted by the New Burlington Galleries.[7]
Coombs and Knollys befriended many clients like Lady Ottoline Morrell, Duncan Grant and Graham Sutherland.[4]
