An illustrated talk about the artist Dame Laura Knight RA RWA (1877-1970), particularly looking at her relationship with the Newlyn School and Lamorna art colonies in West Cornwall, and the lifelong friendships she formed in her Cornish years, including Alfred Munnings, Eileen Mayo, Ella Naper and Bernard Walke.

Alison Bevan graduated in Art History from Nottingham University in 1986, and has spent a 35+ year career working in public art galleries, most recently as Director of the Royal West of England Academy of Art in Bristol (2013-2024). From 1999 to 2013, she was Director of Penlee House Gallery & Museum, Penzance, which specialises in exhibiting the work of the Newlyn, Lamorna and St Ives colonies (1880-1940), a subject on which she became an acknowledged expert and has lectured in the UK, USA and France, and published in the UK and Australia. She is a Fellow of and Mentor for the Museums Association, an Honorary Research Fellow of the University of Bristol and was Chair of the South Western Federation of Museums and Galleries from 2009-12. She was awarded the British Empire Medal in the 2013 New Year’s Honours for services to Cultural Heritage in Cornwall.