Exhibition of works by artist Cedric Morris at the Granary Gallery in Berwick

It features more than 20 significant loans from Tate, National Portrait Gallery, Gainsborough’s House and Philip Mould Gallery – plus a number from private collections.

Cedric Morris: Artist, Plantsman & Traveller explores the artist’s defining passions and represents a landmark opportunity to enjoy a variety of subjects by one of the most talented painters in 20th Century British art.

From playful pencil sketches of customers in Parisian and Algerian cafes during the early 1920s to vibrant still lifes of eggs and seedlings in the 1940’s, landscapes and view paintings he made in later life while travelling in Portugal and Turkey on plant-finding trips, the exhibition shows how, throughout his career, Morris painted a variety of subjects in a very direct and idiosyncratic way, using bold impasto colours.

Iris Seedlings (1943, on loan from Tate) is emblematic of Morris’ chief renown as an accomplished painter of the natural world, particularly of irises.

The exhibition also includes a portrait of Morris by Lucian Freud and three pieces by Cedric’s lifelong partner, Arthur Lett-Haines.

James Lowther, head of visual arts at The Maltings (Berwick) Trust, said: “Morris’ affinity with the natural world and an early environmentalist feel particularly relevant to rural Northumberland and we look forward to bringing his work to Berwick and the North East for the first time.”

Entry to see Cedric Morris: Artist, Plantsman & Traveller, which runs from June 7 to October 12, is free – with donations to support The Maltings (Berwick) Trust very welcome.