Victor Pasmore, Kenneth Martin, Mary Martin and Anthony Hill are the key figures associated with the movement. They were inspired by the theories of the American artist Charles Biederman and explored the legacy of the ‘constructive art’ made in the 1930s by Ben Nicholson, Barbara Hepworth and Naum Gabo, whose contribution to the Russian constructivism was exemplary.

Anthony Hill insisted on using the term constructionism for the British phenomenon, but constructivism is more commonly used.