The son of artists, Ben Nicholson studied briefly at the Slade before travelling for several years through Europe and the United States. His earliest paintings were still lifes influenced by those of his father, William Nicholson. But in the 1920s he began painting figurative and abstract works inspired by Post Impressionism and Cubism.Widely exhibited throughout the 1920s and 30s he became identified with the Constructivist Movement which advocated mathematical precision, clean lines and an absence of ornament.  www.tate.org.uk