Getting to know Peter Gregory - by Valerie Holman
Ahead of the publication of her book on Peter Gregory (1887-1959), former Lund Humphries Chairman and patron of the arts, author Valerie Holman reflects on how her research into primary sources (letters, diaries, notes) revealed the man behind the reputation...
Peter Gregory, Saint Tropez, 1950s. Photograph © Collection of Susannah Davidson.
Peter Gregory referred to himself simply as ‘an industrialist’ but he was much more than that. A Yorkshireman who, by 1945, had risen through the ranks to become chairman of the Bradford printing and publishing firm of Lund Humphries, he published the first major monograph on Henry Moore, followed by lavishly-illustrated and comprehensive volumes on Barbara Hepworth, Ben Nicholson and Paul Nash, which set a new standard for devoting serious scholarship to contemporary artists. Professional interactions alone, though, cannot account for the extent of his art world network, nor do they explain how Moore came to consider Gregory his closest friend. While A Short History of Lund Humphries (2015) gave an account of the firm’s major publications, the man at the helm remained elusive. Subsequent archival research, however, revealed just how much time Gregory devoted to writing, and it was through reading his own words that his engaging personality began to emerge.
'Written in a frightful hurry' - Letter from Peter Gregory to Jane Drew, 15 May 1957
In 1957, Peter Gregory received a complaint from the pioneering modernist architect, Jane Drew, with whom he had by then exchanged several hundred letters. He replied: ‘I feel very humiliated after your order to me that I should have all my letters typewritten and not in my own fair calligraphy!!!’ (Emphasis in the original.)[1] Gregory had already challenged his many correspondents by declaring that he had never received a letter he could not decipher, so it was understood that the same ability was expected of them. Problems arose with his hand-written communications not just from how he formed individual letters, but from his tendency to cover the entire surface – particularly aerograms – with smaller and smaller script that ended up encircling the main text or disappearing off the edge. Seemingly averse to conventional punctuation, his manuscripts often resemble musical notation, their air-borne colons looking like signs to draw breath. He was the author of only one published book, a record of his regiment’s actions during the First World War, but he wrote constantly – in diaries, travel journals, business correspondence and letters to friends. Whether through self-analysis, bearing witness to contemporary events, or offering a critique of what he had read, Peter Gregory comes vividly to life in what he writes. There is an all-pervasive sense of haste, and of frustration that he cannot express himself better or find words equal to the beauty or splendour he has experienced, but most of his writing was squeezed into an already over-full life, and his Second World War diary, for instance, contains several entries scribbled in a dug-out at 3am. His style can be clumsy but his language is always direct and unembellished, its tone suggesting more transient states for, as he wrote to Barbara Hepworth in the autumn of 1949, ‘Moods are strong influences in my life, especially in my letter-writing life.’
Edward McKnight Kauffer, catalogue cover design for retrospective, 1935. John Johnson Collection, Bodleian Library. Box 2 © Simon Rendall.
What those moods were, and what affected them, are frequently recorded in his diaries, the place where the real texture of his friendships is also to be found: he records occasions when Edward McKnight Kauffer had criticised him or they had argued over ideals, and reflects on how much he values Kauffer’s honest expression of emotion. It was to his diary that Gregory confided his feelings about those with whom he came into contact, noting the foibles of his fellow censors at the Ministry of Information, or his feelings about a visitor who over-stayed her welcome: ‘Drat the woman!’. Sights that moved Gregory often prompted him to reminisce: interspersed with a detailed chronicle of events in 1940, are vivid memories of his early life, a looping narrative structure that gives insight into his thought processes, and shows why some memories above all others retained their powerful hold throughout his life.
Aspects of British Art, ICA exhibition, 1950, Photograph © The Collection of Anne Massey.
Why do we need to know any of this, or indeed need to know about Gregory at all? Because although by profession he was a printer and publisher, for 30 years he was also a quietly influential figure in the world of modern art, who commanded both affection and respect. Over time, he held key posts in virtually every visual arts organisation: for example, as Secretary of the War Artists Advisory Committee, and later the Contemporary Art Society; as co-founder of the Institute of Contemporary Arts, and of the Gregory Fellowships in the Arts, and as a member of the Visual Arts Panel of the Arts Council. He was also an assiduous patron, collector, and promoter of young painters, sculptors and designers whom he loyally continued to support throughout their careers. By fighting for artists on so many fronts, he was instrumental in making contemporary art not only culturally acceptable, but accessible across the country.
Valerie Holman, 2024
Valerie's book 'Peter Gregory: Publisher and Patron of Modern British Artists' is available to pre-order now and will publish on 1st October 2024.
[1] Peter Gregory to Jane Drew, 15 May 1957. Letter courtesy of Frances Nation.