BLAIR, Helen [Nell]

1907 - 1997

Helen Sara[h] Blair was born in New Zealand on 26 September 1907, although in 1939 she gave the year of birth as 1908, the daughter of a judge. By 1922 she had already achieved some commercial success with 'The Why Fairy Book' (1922), a collection of stories about fairies written and illustrated by the author when she was 14 years old. After returning to New Zealand from her studies in Paris, she met fellow artist John Hutton and together, they embarked on a successful and prolific collaborative relationship and married in St Paul’s Cathedral, Wellington on 11 September 1934. Before leaving New Zealand for England, in March 1936 John and Nell held a joint exhibition, in collaboration with a friend Hinehauone Coralie Cook née Cameron, known as Corrie Cameron (14 February 1904–7 June 1993), who had studied art in Paris with Nell, in the lounge of Kirkcaldie and Stains, the principal department store in Wellington. In 1939 she was living in a sort of commune which John Platts-Mills Q.C. (4 October March 18 1906-26 October 2001), and his artist wife Janet Katherine (18 March 1910-1992) had established at Assington Hall, Further Street, Great Waldingfield, Suffolk, together with her husband and their twin sons Warwick Hutton later an artist, glass engraver and illustrator, and Macaillan Hutton, later an architect, they had a further son Peter Hutton, a teacher. On 7 April 1949, the Hutton's moved to Landermere Creek, near Thorpe-le-Soken, Essex, living firstly at the 'King’s Head' before renting from psychoanalyst Karin Stephen (1890-1953), moving into one of the Gull Cottages, where John had a glass studio in the garden which Eduardo Paolozzi (1924-2005) had used to make his sculptures. They continued to work and exhibit together in England even after their divorce in 1960 and John's remarriage. Helen Blair made distinctive modernist works, often painted with a palette knife with many of her paintings containing classical or biblical references, particularly her landscapes, which recall the backdrops to the figure paintings of the Old Masters. Later in life she turned to making collages which were mostly non-figurative many of these were shown at exhibitions in Cambridge. The author of 'The Technique of Collage' (1969) and, after a world tour studying stones, 'Practical Gemstones' (1972), which was illustrated by her son Warwick, her other works include'Textile Structures' (1975) and 'Mosaic Making Techniques' (1977). Helen Sara Blair died at 52 Warkworth Terrace, Cambridge on 20 October 1997 when the year of her birth is given as 1907. Her husband painted an oil 'Nell Hutton at Landermere'.

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Works by This Artist