[1] The WEA and Durham University arranged for a tutor, painter and teacher Robert Lyon (1894-1978), to instruct the group, but its members, mainly men employed by the Woodhorn and Ellington Collieries, quickly grew dissatisfied with the course.
By the early 1940s the Group had exhibited in London, and they continued to thrive after Lyon left to become the fourth Principal of Edinburgh College of Art.
Over the next few years the work of the Group was noticed and praised by a number of prominent British artists and critics, such as Julian Trevelyan and Henry Moore.
After World War II, critical interest in the Group waned, but the men continued to meet weekly, producing new art and taking on new members.
The last surviving member of the Ashington Group John F. (Jack) Harrison, died in 2004, a few months short of his hundredth birthday.