The work of two of Falmouth's most famous painters will be displayed in a new exhibition in Truro.

The display featuring work from Charles Napier Hemy and Henry Scott Tuke will run from Thursday to Sunday (October 4 to 7) at The Alverton Hotel and celebrates Cornwall in seascapes, landscapes, coastal and marine subjects.

Those who love Cornish art will discover plenty to enjoy, with works by many of the pioneering painters who set up their studios and found their inspiration and fame in the artistic colonies of Falmouth, Newlyn, Lamorna and St. Ives in the late 19th and early 20th centuries.

Elford Fine Art’s exhibition includes works by two of Falmouth’s most famous painters. Charles Napier Hemy and Henry Scott Tuke are regarded among Britain’s finest marine artists and often worked from floating studios aboard their own boats to recreate the drama of being on the water, close to the vessels they were painting.

It was a golden age, when Cornwall was at the forefront of British art and painters gathered here from all over the world. Among the most innovative was Richard Hayley Lever, an Australian who arrived at St. Ives in 1899 via London and Paris.

Lever spent 15 years at St. Ives and established a worldwide reputation for his marine and harbour paintings. On sale in Elford Fine Art’s exhibition are three outstanding canvases, including a glorious example, dating from 1913, entitled Summer, St. Ives. This impressive painting features beached boats in the harbour at low tide, with the view across from Smeaton’s Pier to Porthminster Beach and Tregenna Woods beyond.

Other important early St. Ives artists include John Anthony Park, Terrick Williams, George Turland Goosey and William Cox and from the Newlyn School there are pictures by Walter Langley, Norman Garstin, Elizabeth Forbes, Harold Harvey and Garnet Ruskin Wolseley.

The dramatic natural environment of Lamorna, just along the coast, was an artist’s paradise, too, with its narrow lane and tumbling stream winding through the wooded valley down to the sea. Samuel John Lamorna Birch was the father figure of the group of artists who settled here, and the exhibition includes a watercolour of Kynance Cove and an oil of Vellan Drucksia watermill, which was exhibited at The Royal Academy.

Other artists in the exhibition include Denys Law, John William Schofield, John Clarke Isaac Uren and, from the 21st Century, Julie Brett, Duncan Palmar, Tracy Hall and Rosalind Pierson, the President of The Royal Society of Miniature Painters, Sculptors and Gravers.

The four-day exhibition and sale at The Alverton Hotel in Truro is open from this Thursday, October 4 to Sunday, October 7 (11 a.m. to 4 p.m.). For more information, call 07712 137272 or visit www.elfordfineart.co.uk