Cambridge Postcards

August Macke was a German Expressionist painter and one of the leading members of the group Der Blaue Reiter (The Blue Rider). Macke studied at the Düsseldorf Academy from 1904 to 1906. During his first trip to Paris in 1907 he was profoundly influenced by the work of the Impressionist painters. In 1909 Macke again visted Paris and on this trip discovered the work of Henri Matisse and the other Fauve artists. This convinced Macke to use brighter, less-naturalistic colours, applied in broad brushstrokes. In 1911 Macke joined Der Blaue Reiter, which had been founded by Franz Marc and Wassily Kandinsky. In 1912 Macke met the French painter Robert Delaunay, who worked in a colourful Cubistinfluenced style. Subsequently, Macke introduced a Cubist style into his own paintings.

Vanessa Bell was an English painter, member of the Bloomsbury Group and the sister of Virginia Woolf. In 1904, Vanessa and her siblings moved to Bloomsbury, where they met and began socialising with the artists, writers and intellectuals who would become known as the Bloomsbury Group. In 1907, she married fellow Bloomsbury member Clive Bell. Vanessa, Clive, the painter Duncan Grant and the writer David Garnett moved to the Sussex countryside shortly before the outbreak of the First World War, and settled at Charleston Farmhouse near Firle. In 1912, alongside Picasso and Matisse, Bell exhibited her work in the Second Post-Impressionist Exhibition at the Grafton Galleries, London.

Cedric Morris was a British artist, art teacher and plantsman. He was born in Swansea in South Wales, but worked mainly in East Anglia. Cedric grew up in Sketty, South Wales. On leaving school he spent his younger years intermittently abroad, regularly travelling across Europe and North Africa, whilst renting studios in Cornwall, Paris and London. In the 1930s, Cedric and his partner, the artist Arthur Lett-Haines made Suffolk their permanent base, moving to Pound Farm in Higham where his garden became much admired. Morris developed a post-Impressionist style for portraits, landscapes and highly decorative style for still-life.