Biography

Ruth Simpson - 1889 - 1964

Ruth Simpson came to Newlyn in 1911/12 to study at Stanhope Forbes’ Painting School. She met fellow artist Charles Simpson shortly after her arrival in Newlyn and they were married in 1913.

At first they lived in Newlyn, where their daughter Leonora was born, later moving briefly to Bodriggy at Lamorna, and then to St. Ives in 1916. In St. Ives Charles and Ruth Simpson ran a painting school, where Ruth taught portrait painting, which was always to be her special interest.

Both Ruth and Charles played key roles in the social life of the artists colony, and Ruth painted portraits of several of her fellow women artists, including Ella Naper and Gertrude Harvey.

In 1924 the couple moved to London, returning to Lamorna in 1931. She died in Penzance in 1964.