Sorcha Dallas

For 60 years Gimpel Fils has supported thoughtful and innovative art. From Barbra Hepworth’s explorations of shape and form to Christopher Stewart’s meditations on global politics, we have encouraged artists who have pushed the boundaries of their medium and subject matter. This exhibition will include a cross section of work by artists represented by the gallery since 1946 with a focus on the gallery’s support of post-war sculpture.

Brothers Charles and Peter Gimpel opened Gimpel Fils to honour their father on Duke Street in 1946, moving to South Molton Street in 1948. The mosaic doorstep designed by Louis Le Brocquy for the South Molton Street gallery is still visible today. What is particularly notable about the early decades of the gallery’s programme is the balance Charles and Peter found between exhibiting the avant-guard, whilst continuing to show older and more familiar names such as Degas, Modigliani, Cezanne and Mondrian. Charles and Peter had grown up amidst the Paris art works, and Gimpel Fils naturally reflected this French background. Throughout the 1950s and 1960s Gimpel Fils supported young contemporary artists when encouragement, both moral and financial, was scarce. The gallery gave Lynn Chadwick, Antony Caro, Peter Lanyon and Alan Davie their first exhibitions.

The gallery moved again to its present location on Davis Street in 1972, and the opening show was an exhibition of marble sculpture by Isamu Noguchi. It is significant that when the gallery underwent refurbishment in 2000, we again opened the new space with work by a pioneering sculptor, Richard Wilson.

This current exhibition celebrating 60 years of Gimpel Fils is also a celebration of sculpture. The history and legacy of the gallery is undoubtedly tied up with the importance of post war British sculpture. We have invited artist Des Hughes to select works from the gallery’s archives and place them alongside artwork by contemporary sculptor’s in order to create a dialogue between old and new sculptural practices. We hope that this exhibition will enable a reassessment of the importance of the generation of artists supported by Gimpel Fils 1950s and 1960s, and their influence on current artistic forms and concerns. We are delighted that so many artists who have never shown at Gimpel Fils have been willing to participate in this exciting and significant exhibition.

Alan Davie, Albert Irvine, Alex Frost, Alexander Calder, Anthony Benjamin, Anthony Caro, Audrey Reynolds, Barbara Hepworth, Ben Nicholson, Berbard Meadows, Bob and Roberta Smith, Brian Griffiths, Callum Morton, Ceal Floyer, Eva Rothschild, Gedi Sibony, Georges Mathieu, Haim Steinbach, Henry Moore, Isamu Noguchi, Ivon Hitchens, Jim Dine, Jo Brinton, Josef Albers, Julio Gonzalez, Karen Appel, Keith Wilson Kenneth Armitage, Larry Rivers, Lynn Chadwick, Mark Wilsher, Miguel Oritx Berrocal, Niki de Saint Phalle, Peter Davies, Peter Lanyon, Reg Butler, Robert Adams, Roger Hilton, Sergio de Camargo, Steven Gontarski, Stuart Cumberland, Victor Vasarely, William Scott, Yves Klein