Frances Spalding Explained

Frances Spalding
Birth Name:	Frances Crabtree
Birth Date:	16 July 1960

Frances Spalding (née Crabtree; born 16 July 1950^[1]) is a British art historian, writer and a former editor of The Burlington Magazine.

Life

Frances Crabtree studied at the University of Nottingham and gained her PhD for a study of Roger Fry. She taught art history at Sheffield City Polytechnic (19781988) before becoming a freelance writer and curator. She returned to academic work to take up the post of professor of Art History at Newcastle University in 2000.^[2]

Spalding specialises in 20th-century British art, biography and cultural history and her work includes essays, criticism and reviews. She curated the 2003 exhibition "John Piper in the 1930s: Abstraction on the Beach" at Dulwich Picture Gallery in south London.^[3] She has also written a study of poet Stevie Smith and a biography of John and Myfanwy Piper. When reviewing John Piper, Myfanwy Piper: Lives in Art, The Independent said of Spalding "At her scintillating best, she is both a brilliant encapsulator and shrewd summer-up; above all, an enthusiast and advocate whose wisdom makes you eager for her subject."^[4]

Spalding was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature in 1984.^[5] She was appointed as Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE) in the Birthday Honours 2005 for services to literature. She is a trustee of the Charleston Trust.

Spalding became the Editor of The Burlington Magazine in September 2015, leaving in August 2016.^[6]

In 1974, Crabtree married Julian Spalding; the couple divorced in 1991.

Selected publications

• Magnificent Dreams: Burne-Jones and the Late Victorians (1978)
• Whistler (1979)
• Vanessa Bell (1979,)^[7]
• Roger Fry: Art and Life (1980)
• Book: Spalding, Frances. Frances Spalding. 1. Vanessa Bell: Portrait of the Bloomsbury Artist. 2016. 1983. I.B.Tauris. 978-1-78453-241-3.
• British Art since 1900 (1986)
• Stevie Smith: A Critical Biography (1988)
• 20th Century Painters and Sculptors: Dictionary of British Art (1990)
• Dance Till the Stars Come Down: A Biography of John Minton (1991)
• Virginia Woolf: Paper Darts: the Illustrated Letters (ed) (1991)
• Duncan Grant: A Biography (1997)
• The Tate: A History (1998)
• Ravilious in Public: A Guide to Works by the Artist in Public Collections (2002)
• John Piper in the 1930s: Abstraction on the Beach (2003)
• Gwen Raverat: Friends, Family and Affections (2001)
• The Bloomsbury Group, National Portrait Gallery Insights (2005)
• John Piper, Myfanwy Piper: Lives in Art, Oxford University Press (2009,)

Reviews

• Spalding . Frances. June 2011 . The contemporaneous past: reviving native traditions, in modern ways . . 332 . 16–17.
• Review of: Book: Harris, Alexandra . Romantic moderns: English writers, artists and the imagination from Virginia Woolf to John Piper . 2010. . 9780500251713.

Notes and References

1. Book: Spalding, Prof. Frances . Who's Who 2013 . . 2013 . 12 January 2013 . Oxford University Press, December 2012; online edition, November 2012.
2. Book: The International Who's Who of Women 2002. London. Europa Publications. 2001. 540. 9781857431223 .
3. Web site: John Piper in the 1930s – Abstraction on the Beach . Studio International . 14 February 2014 .
4. News: Dunnett, Roderic . John Piper, Myfanwy Piper: lives in art, By Frances Spalding . . 20 November 2009 . 15 February 2014 .
5. Web site: Royal Society of Literature: All Fellows . . 10 August 2010 . dead . https://web.archive.org/web/20100305070326/http://www.rslit.org/content/fellows . 5 March 2010 . dmy .
6. News: Editor quits oldest art magazine after brush with staff . Malvern . Jack . 7 October 2016 . . 25 July 2019.
7. Web site: Vanessa Bell by Frances Spalding . Goodreads . 12 January 2016.