Marion Grace Hocken (1923-1987)

Marion Grace Hocken (1923-1987). Born in Zennor, Cornwall she was a student at Leonard John Fuller's St Ives School of Painting after beginning her studies at the Redruth School of Art and the Brighton School of Art. A keen botanist and Fellow of the Zoological Society and the Royal Entomological Society, she specialised in paintings of flowers which were acclaimed at the Paris Salon. The WCAA inherited one of her scrapbooks, and with it some correspondence (mainly Christmas cards) with her friends and acquaintances. Hocken was a founder member of the Penwith Society, along with Ben Nicholson and Barbara Hepworth. Her most controversial work was a painting, The Hollow Men: a visual satire on the community politics of St Ives which raised many eyebrows and aroused some ferocious animosity. She married Mervyn Paul in later life.