George Peter Lanyon (8 February 1918 – 31 August 1964) was a British painter[1] of landscapes leaning heavily towards abstraction.
Despite his early death at the age of forty-six he achieved a body of work that is amongst the most original and important reappraisals of modernism in painting to be found anywhere.
He died in Taunton, Somerset, as the result of injuries received in a gliding accident and is buried in St. Uny's Church, Lelant.
In 2015 Lanyon's Gliding Paintings were shown as a set in the Soaring Flight exhibition at the Courtauld Gallery, London.
In 1937 he met Adrian Stokes who is thought to have introduced him to contemporary painting and sculpture and who advised him to go to the Euston Road School where he studied for four months under Victor Pasmore.
In 1939 he met established artists Ben Nicholson, Barbara Hepworth and Naum Gabo who had moved to St Ives on the outbreak of the Second World War.
He travelled around Italy with his wife Sheila in the summer of 1950 and became a leading figure in the St. Ives group of artists.
He had his first solo exhibition at the Lefevre Gallery, London in 1949 and taught at the Bath Academy of Art, Corsham from 1951 to 1957 (where William Scott was senior painting tutor).
On the 1957 trip to New York, he met Joseph Glasco who became a friend and later helped Lanyon work with Viviano.