CHRISTOPHER HULL GALLERY
Christopher Robert Hull (19 December 1927-9 April 2007) established his first Gallery in 1974. Christopher was the son of a barrister and a nephew of Ipswich MP, Richard Rapier Stokes (27 January 1897–3 August 1957), Hull initially trained as a barrister but was never called to the Bar but became a racing tipster who turned art dealer to pursue his lifelong enthusiasm for 20th-century British artists. In 1974 he was living, with his first wife and their children in Wimbledon village, just off the Common, and when a neighbouring teashop closed, he took over the premises and reopened them as the Annexe Gallery, showing such artists as Tessa Newcomb and Pauline Vincent (1940-2012). Seven years later, emboldened by his modest but genuine success as an art dealer, he took his gallery to Fulham Road, London and two years later nearer the heart of things, to Belgravia. Hull was enthusiastic about the next generation, the so-called Neo-Romantics of the 1940s, especially Michael Ayrton (20 February 1921-17 November 1975) and John Leith Craxton (3 October 1922–17 November 2009) but his main interest as a dealer was in modern British artists. As well as senior figures such as Norman Adams (9 February 1927-9 March 2005), his interest included such younger discoveries as Michael John Peckham (2 August 1935–13 August 2021), Sarah Raphael, Kitty North (July 1963-), Tessa Newcomb, Sarah Natasha Raphael, David Lewis (1955-) and Claire Harrigan (1966-). Hull was the most approachable of West End dealers, always happy to chat to anyone who wandered into the gallery, especially if they proved sympathetic to one of his pet artists. Hull was married twice, firstly to Cecilia Pollen, by whom he had four sons and one daughter; and, after the first marriage was dissolved, to Suzanne Byam Shaw, who survives him. The 17 Motcomb Street Gallery, Hull's third, in Belgravia closed in 1998. Other Suffolk artists who exhibited with Christopher Hull include Eileen Bell; Elsie Evelyn Few and Katherine Hamilton .