'I tend Surrealist painter's forgotten grave'

Seth Dellow has tried to track down Tristram Hillier's family

For three years, an art lover has been tending the forgotten grave of a Surrealist painter after he discovered it overgrown and obscured by lichen.

Tristram Hillier lies in the parish churchyard of Glanvilles Wootton in north Dorset but the reason he is buried there is unclear.

Nonetheless, his grave is regularly cleaned by journalist Seth Dellow, from Ilminster, Somerset, who has also tried to track down the artist's family.

He said he decided to care for the plot because he liked Surrealism and found it "weird and bizarre" that Hillier would be buried there.

Hillier was a member of the Unit One modernist group of the 1930s, along with Henry Moore, Barbara Hepworth and founder Paul Nash.

Many of his paintings were inspired by the landscapes of north Dorset and Somerset and, following his death in Bristol in 1983, he was buried at St Mary's in Glanvilles Wootton.

Mr Dellow said when he found the gravestone it was "completely neglected, covered in lichen, the grass had completely overgrown it".

"The lichen was very thick so I thought I'd start cleaning it up - that was a few years ago now," he said.

Mr Dellow contacted the parish clerk and churchwarden, hoping to track down the artist's family but without success.

"I think what really needs doing is the gold lettering," he said.

"The weather has had an effect. It's starting to disappear and there's a risk that one day you won't be able to read what it says."

Tristram Hiller is buried in the churchyard of St Mary the Virgin in Glanvilles Wootton

Hillier was born in China, the son of a diplomat, but attended school in Somerset.

He lived for more than two decades in France and served in the Royal Navy during World War Two before settling in East Pennard, 20 miles away from his final resting place.

Mr Dellow said: "He was painting rural scenes. You don't really get many British Surrealists who are painting those scenes, especially in Somerset and north Dorset.

"I don't know why he's buried here but he did paint parts of Dorset - in the area near Sherborne, Wincanton, and places like Cucklington, near the border.

"For some reason he was very attracted to those areas.

"I really like Surrealism as an art form. It was a time when Britain had just been to war and it was a difficult time for the country.

"It's just a surreal story to have a Surrealist from Somerset and Dorset buried here, that's what I find really weird and bizarre, but I love it."