Hillier was strongly influenced by surrealism and particularly the work of Max Ernst and de Chirico. In this work, the illusionistic representation of space and the strong shadows recall the landscapes of Salvador Dalí, an artist Hillier knew personally from his time as a student in Paris. In 1945, following the end of World War II, Hillier settled in Somerset and this work depicts Quantoxhead beach close to his home.
Tristram Hillier (English, 1905 - 1983)
Hillier was born in China but his family moved to England soon after his birth. He studied at Cambridge University for two years and was subsequently apprenticed to a firm of chartered accountants. However this career was quickly abandoned, when he decided to study at the Slade School of Fine Art from 1926. Until 1940 Hillier spent a great deal of time in France but retained strong links with London. In 1933 he joined the modernist group, 'Unit One'. Hillier developed his distinctive style in the mid-1930s, combining a precise style of painting with a sense of stillness evoking the strangeness of Surrealism.