‘Hevva Hevva’ Falmouth Art Gallery

Henrietta Graham with Guest Speaker Cornish restaurateur and founder of ‘Forgotten Fish’ Richard Adams at the preview of Hevva Hevva

Falmouth Art Gallery is renowned for having one of the leading art Collections in South West England. Featuring works by old masters, major Victorian Artist, British and French Impressionists and most famously maritime artists.

2022 saw the opening of  ‘Hevva Hevva; Fishing in Cornwall, an Exhibition.’

This exhibition explores the importance and impact of the fishing industry in Cornwall, through history and up to present day.

Falmouth Art Gallery contacted Newlyn Harbour for the loan of Award Winning painting from The Royal Society of Marine Artists - ’Newlyn Fish Auction’ by Henrietta Graham from their art Collection to feature in this exhibition.

‘Hevva’ is a word from the Cornish language that is the call  of a fisherman on the sighting of a shoal of fish.

Fishing is the history of Cornwall and can be dated back to 8000 BCE as the vital food source and income for the early settlers and continues to be the heartbeat of the economy today.

Fish Auction

Like the Newlyn School before her, Henrietta Graham reflects on the day to day reality of the fishermans life and the harsh realities of this in her work, and not the romantic coastal seascapes which dominate the current fashion of Artists in Cornwall.

It is precisely this observation of reality that explains her work in this show along side the art work of the Newlyn School- Stanhope Forbes, Harold Harvey, Percy Craft, Charles Napier Hemy and Henry Scott Tuke.

This short film shows Henrietta Graham on the opening night of the exhibition where her work was hung alongside the great Stanhope Forbes and arguably his greatest painting -‘Fish Sale’