Lunchtime talk- Touring the Swindon Collection, 60 Years On

Curator Sophie Cummings gave another really insightful lunchtime talk on Friday 18 October on this wonderful exhibition which reminds us how truly fabulous some of the paintings donated by

In 1959, the Swindon Collection of Modern British art began a tour of 16 towns and cities of the United Kingdom.

'From Falmouth to Sunderland, Southend-on-Sea to Bolton, thousands of museum visitors were introduced to paintings by Paul Nash, LS Lowry, Gwen John and Graham Sutherland. This new exhibition celebrates the sixtieth anniversary of this tour, which introduced the people of Britain to Swindon’s remarkable art and established the reputation of the ‘Swindon Collection’.

This exhibition brings together the 44 works of art sent ‘on tour’ in 1959 and presents them alongside some of the most important acquisitions we have made in the decades since. The exhibition explores the history of the collection and the ambitions and challenges of touring so many pictures to so many places'.

There were at least 20 of us assembled to hear the talk. There's always something new to learn about the collection and Sophie always brings it to life with anecdotes and stories. For example there was one painting that didn't return from the tour. There's a photograph on the wall at the far end of the gallery showing what it looked like, it depicts the platform at Swindon station, and as Sophie remarked, considering the quality of the work on tour, that painting would have been the least covetable.

 Here's Sophie talking about Ben Nicholson's 'Composition in Black and White' painted in 1933 and gifted by H.J.P.Bomford in 1946. The photo I have taken is a bit full of reflections. I'll find a substitute soon. I had never before really appreciated this painting, but Sophie's explanation of its qualities made me really look again, and I saw much more in it.

Another Bomford gift is a big favourite with many visitors, seen below, 'Winter in Pendelbury', 1943 is a beautifully captured and composed snowy scene.

What I hadn't noticed before was the pub sign seen below, have a look next time you look at the painting.

The current ceramics exhibition is called 'Time for Tea' and has lots of tea related pieces. I hadn't seen this beautiful jug before, it's by Glyn Colledge, stoneware with painted glazes, purchased in 2014.

The next lunchtime talks are:
22 November - about Time for Tea Ceramics exhibition
20 December - Hit Repeat, Prints from the Swindon Collection

Stone Age to Corinium Talk

For our September talk, we were pleased to welcome Amanda Hart, director of the Corinium Museum. They are our nearest museum outside Swindon, and have recently been successful in their Heritage Lottery Fund application, so it was very interesting to hear more about the bid, the museum and some of it's artefacts.  Summarising their HLF grant, they say: 

'Corinium Museum has embarked on an exciting £1.87 million project – “Stone Age to Corinium: Discover the Archaeology of the Cotswolds” and has been successful in securing support from The Heritage Lottery Fund.

The aims are to create a museum that is more relevant to today’s communities, maximising on the building spaces, enhancing the visitor journey through reinterpretation and improved access, and working with new partners to produce a vibrant programme of archaeology related events and activities, which will help to make the museum more resilient and sustainable.'

 Amanda gave us a run through of the history of Corinium Museum, firstly saying that they had undergone a rebranding exercise in 2013 with funding from the Arts Council, including a website with an online shop. Here are some of the main points gleaned from the talk:

In 1849, two mosaics were discovered when putting in new sewage pipes, the Earl of Bathhurst, an avid collector of archaeology was keen to show them to people, and opened a museum in 1856, at the same time William Cripps also built a museum at Cripps Mead. There were 2 collections, both gifted to the town. A single museum opened in 1938, and a photograph showed the audience at their talks were exclusively men, and artefacts were seen leaning against walls. The museum closed again in 1939, but from 1960-75, there were large public excavations in Cirencester, in 1964, they found the remains of Cirencester Abbey which was medieval, mostly Roman. In 1970, the urban district council proposed buying the neighbouring buildings to the main museum, so there are two buildings forming the museum.

Amanda talked about considering their street presence, visitor welcome desk, community space, volunteers, audiences, under 5s giving us a fascinating insight into their plans.

Amanda talking to the audience, and below a general view of the audience taken after the talk

Taking photographs from one side of the room is not a good idea, but thought I'd include them.
The slide below is a photo of rare objects that will go on display.

  A couple of weeks before the talk, I visited the Corinium Museum and took a few photos.

 The right hand side building had a lot of scaffolding around it, and that's the main entrance, and below is the left hand side. I do like the hanging flag things. I wonder if Swindon MAG could have one?

 There's a charming garden area beside the cafe with a central weeping tree

 and a couple of beds with Verbena bonariensis and box taking centre stage. The Bloom judges said, if you want to gain good marks, Verbena b is the plant to use.

 One of the fundraising ideas is to ask people to buy a Corinium creature sticker to help raise funds to help conserve stored objects and tell their story. There are five animals, a hare, £500, lion, £100, owl, £50, cockerel £25 and a dog £25, more information here

 I loved this stone relief of three mother goddesses found at Ashcroft, Cirencester in 1899. They are made of local ooilitic limestone, and date back to 2nd or 3rd century AD

 This one was found at the same time, it is also of mother goddesses, it is very classical in style and in marked contrast to the one above which is rather stern and upright.

 Here's the Hare Mosaic, it's virtually complete and was found in a Roman townhouse at The Beeches, it dates to 4th century AD. Not long after it was covered by a hypocaust system, an ancient Roman heating system, comprising a hollow space under the floor of a building, into which hot air was directed. This is apparently a unique motif as a centrepiece in Britain. It has tiny pieces of green glass in the hare's back.

 I took this photo on the way out because  I was talking to Amanda in one of the rooms behind the yellow machinery

 On the way back to the car park, I walked through the centre of Cirencester and was reminded of how old the place is.

I'm hoping we can organise a visit to Corinium Museum in 2020, it's a fabulous place.

 

 

Ken White's Private View

The Friends' committee organised a Private View for Ken White's exhibition currently in the gallery at the museum on the first day of the exhibition. There was a fabulous turn out, with around 90 people attending, and canapes provided by The Olive Tree cafe, situated adjacent to TWIGS. I'll post a few of the photos I took during the evening.

 We had a bar licence for the evening and so were able to sell alcohol from the 'bar' seen above

 Phyllida, canapes in left hand, and Ruth above chatting

 Canapes seen on the right hand side of the photo, and below I asked Graham if he would pose with this picture because his polo shirt was almost the same colour as the smoke in the painting.

 It wasn't easy to get a photo of Ken in relaxed pose, here he is behind Vicky and Sally

 Jeremy and Marion having a chat

 Phyllida with canapes in the entrance to the gallery, with Martin enjoying them

 Sophie Cummings, Curator at Swindon Museum and Art Gallery was kind enough to come and chat about the exhibitions, and when she would be giving lunch time talks, I think.
The next FREE lunchtime talk is tomorrow 18 October from 12.30pm-1.00pm about the exhibition: 'Touring the Swindon Collection 60 years On', about the exhibition in the main part of the gallery

 Here's another photo of Ken White

 and Sophie again, in the photo below, with Angela Atkinson in blue with her back to the camera. Angela has written a book in association with Ken about his life and work, available in the museum shop, booksellers in the town, and online, it's well worth a look with masses of illustrations. I haven't read it yet, just looked at the pictures so far, and they're brilliant.

 Tom Seaward from Swindon Advertiser wrote a piece in the Adver to celebrate the show, and here's Ken below with brother Mike and his wife Sue at the end of a brilliant evening. Thank you to all those who came and made it very special. We raised almost £200 in the raffle donated by Ken, it was one of his linocuts.

After the PV, some of the committee went to relax in the Eternal Optimist where we were able to discuss the highlights of the evening.

Thank you once again to all those involved who made it such a special evening.
Don't miss Ken White in conversation with Andy Binks at 7.30pm on 28 and 29 November. Tickets from Swindon MAG or www.friendsofsmag.org 

Janet Boulton's Garden

Janet Boulton had a beautiful exhibition in the gallery a couple of years ago, celebrated by an in conversation with Sophie Cummings, organised by the Friends and written up here.  Following that evening, a Friends' visit to Janet's garden was arranged last summer, and postponed because of unfavourable conditions for gardens, and Janet's heavy schedule. When at a recent Private View of 'Touring the Collection: 60 years on', at Swindon Museum and Art Gallery, Janet suggested a visit, I jumped at the chance.
It's a wonderful garden, described on Janet's website with an informative and thorough accompanying video, and also in Gardens Illustrated: 


Janet Boulton’s narrow town garden represents the journey through her life as an artist since coming to live in Abingdon, near Oxford, in 1979. It is adorned with inscribed installations in wood, slate and glass, and other objects with artistic and personal associations. Every day she spends at home, Janet walks up the steps from the kitchen, across a witty chamomile lawn and past ‘flight’ – the word is carved into a slate tablet as a poem to joy – along the winding gravel path to the heart of the garden and through the arch to the studio. “The garden is as much a declaration of my commitment to still life and to Cubism as to the gardens that have inspired my watercolour paintings.”

 Erica Hunningher, Gardens Illustrated, September 2002

 Here's another accolade:

'Janet's house and garden are remarkable. and totally inimitable, almost as individual as Derek Jarman's and probably more approachable than his'.

When I visited Janet, I was encouraged to walk down the garden with my own thoughts, without any explanations. It took me about half an hour to walk down the garden, appreciate the end part of the garden and come back, seeing things very differently than on the way there.

I took a series of photos on my way down the garden:

The clipped box and greenery is often interrupted by bright splashes of colour like these Martagon lilies

This is Hearth, placed at the centre of the garden. Hear. Heart. Earth. Art.

And below this says WILD/NESS

Below is Flower show. Nostalgia. Celebrating a village event.

In this area were these rather amazing Rudbeckia sommerina

This is In memoriam. An old apple picking ladder. A dedication to all lost orchards and Janet's lost apple tree.

I'm not sure what this plant is called, Janet kindly gave me one of hers.

Behind the studio, at the end of the garden is a beautifully laid out very small garden. ML11 8NG is the postcode for Little Sparta- a reminder and an acknowledgement

Beautifully juxtaposed arrangement

Here's the seating area at the end of the garden,

looking at the lavender and postcode for little Sparta

To the left is a shed with the following writing on it: 'Il faut cultiver notre jardin' a quote from Candide. Voltaire's summing up 'After all, the best thing we can do is cultivate our garden'
How true.

Walking back towards the house, the garden looked quite different.

Horizon - a 3 metre horizontal with lettering derived from INFINITE/ INFINITY/ NONFINITO a work evoking the experience of looking at a panorama placed below eye level at a dark part of the garden.

I do know about this, it's 'This is not an Attack' In Ian Hamilton Finlay's Detached sentences on gardening, he writes 'Certain gardens are described as retreats when really they are attacks'. A humorous piece where the spouts of the watering cans could be seen as either trumpets or guns.

This is a Homage to Juan Gris a still life on a table of slightly exaggerated proportions (implying an altar)

A huge Nicotiana sylvestris by the house

The allotment holder depicts a vertical allotment

This was a beautiful geranium with the reddest flowers

And this is a bit hard to see, it's a tribute to Paul Nash, it's a bird's nest

I've included a few of the pieces in the garden, there's lots more in this fabulous garden.