ABSTRACT
Begun in 1947 with a small office in Charlotte Street, the prime movers of the ICA were Roland Penrose, Herbert Read, Peter Watson, Peter (Eric) Gregory and Peter (Noel) Norton. The first exhibition organized, of Surrealist and abstract paintings and sculpture, was held in the basement of the Academy Cinema in Oxford Street in 1948; ‘Forty Years of Modern Art’: The second, which was much more ambitious, and which included Picasso’s picture Les Demoiselles d’’Avignon on loan from New York, was entitled ‘Forty Thousand Years of Modern Art’, in order to underline the inspiration from, and sense of continuity with, the prehistoric and tribal art which the organizers believed to be central to modernism. In 1950 the ICA moved to a first floor gallery in Dover Street, and ultimately, in 1968, to very large premises in Carlton House Terrace, the Mall, refurbished, as were the Dover Street headquarters, by the architect Jane Drew. Since its foundation, the ICA has held many major exhibitions of contemporary art, and has presented lectures, performances, conferences and regular film seasons primarly devoted to the visual arts. The policy of the Institute has always been one of concentrating on the exploration of novel developments in art rather than in holding retrospective or historical surveys.. AW
