A PORTRAIT of Diogenes, the down-and-out friend of the late Robert Lenkiewicz, is among the masterpieces on show in Cornwall for the first time next month to focus on the apparently Effortless Brushstrokes with which great artists create brilliant works.

In a major collaborative exhibition from Saturday, Falmouth Art Gallery and Beside the Wave are showcasing what John Singer Sargent called "conveying the maximum with the minimum", with artists from the 1880s to the present day whose ability to make it look easy only comes from great talent mixed with hard work and study.

"All the artists in Effortless Brushstrokes possess an art and intelligence," says Louise Connell, director of Falmouth Art Gallery. "It's an exciting collaboration with Beside the Wave as we'll be showing past greats like Singer Sargent, Alfred Munnings, Laura Knight and Robert Lenkiewicz alongside leading contemporary artists including Kurt Jackson, Andrew Tozer and Benjamin Warner."

Sir Alfred Munnings' magnificent Whitsuntide – A Gala Day, 1902, is on loan to Falmouth Art Gallery from the Harris Gallery in Preston – the first time it has been shown in Cornwall.

Also in Cornwall for the first time is the portrait by Robert Lenkiewicz (1941-2002) of Diogenes in the Studio Window at Night. It is an extraordinary image of an extraordinary man who lived in a concrete pipe on a rubbish tip in Plymouth.

Among the contemporary masters on show at Beside the Wave and Falmouth Art Gallery are some of the country's leading painters of land and sea including Miles Heseltine, who draws on the thought that abstraction is like Lewis Caroll's Cheshire Cat – the smile remains even after the cat has vanished. With this in mind his seemingly effortless brushstrokes on canvas are the essence of what is being expressed.

Different in subject matter but not in exquisite skill is Paul Wadsworth whose Red Dancer – Creating Life has an almost childlike energy and exuberance which belies the complexity of his work.

Above, Robert Lenkiewicz's Diogenes in the Studio Window at Night. Right, Sir Alfred Munnings' Whitsuntide – A Gala Day, 1902. Left, Paul Wadsworth's Red Dancer – Creating Life.