1915-2003. One of Britain's pioneering generation of abstract painters, Terry Frost began his artistic career in an unusual manner. He sharpened his natural talent for drawing and painting while being held in a POW camp during World War II, and pursued formal artistic training upon his release. Early on, he showed an interest in the clarity, order, and vocabulary of geometric forms associated with Constructivism, and worked as an assistant to noted British sculptor Barbara Hepworth. By 1952, Frost had been given his first solo exhibition at London's Leicester Galleries, and quickly rose to prominence, taking on prestigious teaching positions and being named a Gregory Fellow in painting at Leeds University. He was knighted in 1988.

Frost's paintings incorporate shapes based on the circle and the arc, including half-circles, wedges, crescents, and slivers, sometimes loosely connected or intertwining with one another. Rather than using precise, severe geometric forms that look as though they were created by machines, Frost's shapes reveal a painterly touch, with irregularities to their surfaces and edges that clearly indicate their handmade origins. Though Frost's works are abstract, they draw upon his lifelong observation of nature, with the harbor at St. Ives and the Cornwall coast among his sources of inspiration. Frost's works often evoke the feel of boats rocking at sea, with individual shapes suggesting boat hulls, moorings, and patches of the elusive English sun.