Spreading the Word

 There are still lots of people who don't know Swindon Museum and Art Gallery exists, and if they do are unsure where it is located. During the Covid pandemic, it has been difficult to advertise somewhere, like many other venues, which cannot be open at the moment due to lockdown. The Friends have been looking for ways to publicise this fabulous place to a wider audience, and one of our newer committee members, Angela Atkinson, kindly agreed to put an entry onto the great We Are Swindon site, so here we are, please take a look, I think it's an excellent piece:

https://weareswindon.co.uk/swindons-charity-hub/friends-of-swindon-museum-and-art-gallery/

 For a flavour of the art in our Collection of 20th Century art, please take a look at Art On Tour led by Katie Ackrill and Mags Parker, this aims to share the collections wile the venue is closed.

I've included 'Winter in Pendlebury' by LS Lowry, it seemed apt in the freezing cold weather, although we haven't got the snow.

Evelyn Dunbar: War and Country

We were very fortunate to have Dr Gill Clarke for our January talk on Evelyn Dunbar. The talk was entitled War and Country and it wouldn't surprise anyone who attended the talk to know that Gill has written a book entitled just that, and is an absolute expert on Evelyn Dunbar. I've just looked up 'War and Country' by Gill Clarke on Abe books and found even second hand copies are fetching £45!

I love Evelyn Dunbar's work, thoroughly enjoyed the 'Lost Works' exhibition at Pallant House Gallery, and bought the book, so I was really looking forward to this lavishly illustrated virtual talk on 13 January. Gill met almost everyone associated with Evelyn Dunbar in researching her, and visited all the places where she'd lived, stayed or worked, apart from Evelyn herself who sadly died in 1960 aged just 54. Gill also visited the Imperial War Museum where there's a collection of Evelyn Dunbar's letters.

Evelyn Dunbar went to Rochester Grammar School which was a progressive school where I think members of the Royal Drawing Society came and taught the students and she learned to 'see, remember, reproduce' and trust your eyes. She was the youngest of five children who were keen gardeners; from school she went to the school of art at Rochester and then got a scholarship to the Royal College of Art. At the time she went, William Rothenstein was the principal when she went, he employed practicing artists to lecture to the students. Evelyn Dunbar was romantically linked with Charles Mahoney, her tutor, and in 1931 won a prize awarded by the Times newspaper.

She is well known for the Brockley Murals which she worked on from 1933-36. They were based on fables and were the most important creations of the age. There's a great blog post here about the making of the murals. They can still be seen at Prendergast School. 

Above one of the panels in the mural, the fable referred to is don't cry over spilt milk, and below, The Cock and the Jewel is one of Aesop's fables.

I've taken that photo from the computer, hence the strange effect. Gill also showed us illustrated letters Evelyn had written to people:

In the late 1930s, Evelyn and Charles went their separate ways, Evelyn produced quite a few garden paintings, and exhibited with Edward Bawden. In 1939, she joined the Womens' Land Army and worked at Sparsholt Farm. Evelyn Dunbar was the only female second world war artist.

 In 1942, she met Roger Foley who lived from 1912-2008. Gill knew Roger quite well before his death.

Here is Roger Foley photographed with a portrait Evelyn made of him.

They moved to Wye in 1953 where Roger was a taught at Wye College. Sadly with Evelyn's premature death, they only had 8 years of married life. I'm now going to include some of my favourite paintings, from the Womens' Land Army days and gardens she loved. This one below is 'Womens' Land Army Hostel' c1943, it can be seen at Russell-Cotes Museum in Bournemouth.

This is 'The Fish Shop' 1943 with Roger Folley making an appearance on the bicycle!

This looks like back breaking work, it's entitled 'Sprout Picking in Monmouthshire'

 

Below 'Milking Practice with Artificial Udders'

And 'Canning Demonstration' 1940

The painting below is called 'Women's Knitting Party' 1940

 I love this one 'Land Army Girls Going to Bed' 1943, it reminds me of the Ravilious' 'Attic Bedroom' painting

This painting is titled 'The garden' and is a good example of Evelyn's depiction of a personal space around a house.

Not so easy to see here, but 'Winter Garden' is a wonderful depiction of her garden with her house just visible to the right of the painting.

 You can find many more examples of Evelyn Dunbar's work, the Art UK website has many of those featured here and more:

https://artuk.org/discover/artists/dunbar-evelyn-mary-19061960 

We were going to visit the Bournemouth Arts Club celebratory 100 years of existence in July 2020 at Russell-Cotes, this exhibition 'A Mirror of Our Times: 100 years of British Art' . This exhibition, curated by Dr Gill Clarke and including some 9 works loaned from the Swindon Collection has been postponed until the 14 July-11 October. More details here.

I do hope we can visit this year, and thank you Gill for giving us such a fabulous insight into Evelyn Dunbar.

Desmond's Day in the Guardian today

 There was a lovely piece in today's Guardian's Culture section reminding us that while we are missing being able to visit art galleries during this third lock down, the Guardian are doing what they can to bring art from collections around the country into our homes. Today was the turn of Desmond Morris's painting 'The Mysterious Gift' presented to Swindon Museum and Art Gallery in 1965, Katie Ackrill, engagement officer wrote the lovely article which can be found in full by clicking on the link below: 

https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2021/jan/27/the-great-british-art-tour-swindon-desmond-morris-mysterious-gift

Excellent publicity for Swindon Museum and Art Gallery, and of course our Patron, Desmond Morris.

A reminder about the 3 works we have of Desmond's work we have in the collection can be found here:

http://friendsofsmag.blogspot.com/2020/01/friends-january-social.html

Above The Mysterious Gift 1965, and below 'Girl Selling Flowers', reputedly a painting of Morris's one time girlfriend, Diana Dors painted in 1946 when according to my calculations he was 18!!

and here's a recollection of collecting our latest work which Desmond Morris gave us as a Christmas present in 2019:

http://friendsofsmag.blogspot.com/2020/01/collecting-desmond-morrisss-picture.html

Congratulations Sir Christopher Le Brun

 Congratulations from the Friends of Swindon Museum and Art Gallery to Sir Christopher Le Brun who was awarded a Knighthood for services to the Arts in the New Years Honours 2021. Well done and richly deserved.

His fabulous painting, Hyperion, entered the Swindon Collection 35 years ago, and was part of our 'Big Hitters' online exhibition on the Art UK website 

 We aim to have some sort of connection between our talks speakers and the Collection, and so were thrilled when he agreed to come and give us a talk, almost 4 years ago. Knowing we would need more audience space than available in the current gallery at Apsley House, we hired the hall at Swindon Dance for the occasion. The Curator at the time, Sophie Cummings, interviewed Sir Christopher Le Brun. It was wonderful being able to talk to the great man before the in conversation with Sophie, when I learned, among other things, that when Hyperion was acquired, it was hung in the stairwell of Swindon Dance, the great hook which held it is still in the wall!

The evening was documented in a blog post of course, please click here to read it.

 

 

Our December Talk by James O. Davies

 We were very fortunate in having James Davies giving us a virtual talk in December, beginning with his early interest in photography, and talking about some of the projects he has been involved in over the years. The actual title of the talk was: 'The Photographer, the light, the building and getting it',  I did take some photographs of the computer screen during the talk, including some fascinating ones taken inside Silbury Hill in 2007, inside prisons, power stations and at Stonehenge. I don't think I should use these photographs, but will include some James sent me to advertise his talk to give you an idea of what he means by photographs:

Above is Tokyo Cathedral designed by Kenzo Tange

This is a photograph of the 12th Century archway round a door at St Andrew's church at Great Rollright

Above might be a photograph inside Le Corbusier's Villa Savoye

Above is a photograph of an Angel sculpture from Whitehall Palace in 1686 now at Burnham on Sea in St. Andrew's church and below the font is from a church in Roche, Cornwall

Above Landfall, Poole regarded as one of the finest Modern Movement buildings by one of the finest architects of the inter-war period, and below Malator at Druidstone, Pembrokeshire built in the earth house architectural style.

I'll continue with some information I found by looking up James Davies, and adding the 'O'

 'JAMES O. DAVIES has been an architectural photographer for English Heritage  for twenty three years. He has contributed to many books in that time and his work has been widely exhibited and published  throughout the world. He is also a portrait photographer, twice exhibiting in the National Portrait Gallery and having received various awards, including Nikon Independent Award, Ilford Award, and Jane Bown Portrait Award. He has taken the official Portrait of Her Majesty The Queen Mother, as well as the first ever photographic survey of English Prisons, published in two books. He is currently working on a book about post war buildings in Britain.'

 I then found information about James's book on Stonehenge which I have now bought:

'More than 4000 years old, the true meaning of this ancient, awe-inspiring creation and the secrets of its construction have been lost in the mists of time. Surrounded by mystery, Stonehenge never fails to impress. 

Over the last five years James Davies has been photographing Stonehenge at all times of the day and night, and all through the seasons. With privileged access to the stone circle he has built up a unique portfolio. A Year at Stonehenge brings together the best of his work, while a short expert text summarises our current understanding.

Published to coincide with the opening of a new environmentally sensitive visitor centre and the restoration of the surrounding ceremonial landscape, this is the most visually stunning book available on this most fascinating world heritage site.'

I took notes throughout the fabulously illustrated talk, which I'll include here in an abbreviated form. Keeping verticals true is important, as is waiting for the light to be just right, although it might take all day, with ambient light being particularly important in churches and cathedrals to give the right atmosphere. Moving clutter from the scene you are about to photograph, particularly bags, and making sure the scene is as you want it before photographing it is important. James talked about what makes a great photograph, and showed us examples where he thought he could have done things differently to improve the photograph. James is currently recording the last coal and oil powered power stations, and had some fascinating shots inside them. 

I've got a final note about getting low when taking photographs, and luck = readiness + opportunity there's also a mention of Tom Denny who made a fabulous tryptych at The Chapel of St.Thomas, Gloucester, do click on this link to see them, they were photographed by James O. Davies.

I also found a list of things to remember when taking photographs of buildings, please click on this link  below for a more informative list than mine. A final thank you to James, and a recommendation to follow his Twitter feed @JamesODavies where we find out how James spent New Year's Eve and the photograph he took by moonlight.

 https://heritagecalling.com/2015/10/08/tips-for-photographing-buildings/

 

 

Beauty of Nature: Incompetence of Painting, a Talk by Dr Mike Pringle

 We were very pleased to welcome Dr Mike Pringle, a professional in the arts and heritage sector, for our November Zoom talk. For those not yet familiar with Mike, there's a great interview with him here where he talks about taking over the Richard Jefferies Museum over 10 years ago, and the way forward, and here's more information on the Green Rook website.

 I slightly worried by the title of the talk, it's challenging, but being Mike, he researched it very well, and he treated us to a fantastic slide show of photographs, many of which appear in his latest book, out soon, and all taken by local photographers. I did my usual photographing from the computer screen, but it gives you an idea of some of the images Mike talked about.

Mike started by talking about a Lascaux cave painting estimated to be 17 thousand years old, and invited us to compare the depictions of the animals with what those animals may have looked like.

The next painting depicted two horses, the one on the left is fairly horse like, but the artist had clearly not seen a horse from the front.

Depictions vary, and artists can produce photorealistic paintings of horses, do they capture the beauty of the horse? Mike then introduced the writer Richard Jefferies who grew up at the farmhouse depicted here by Tim Carroll.

Jefferies loved the countryside around where he grew up, his parents were farmers, his sister Sarah painted these cattle seen below.

Jeffieries was a nature lover, he had a passion for the countryside, and created a fantasy world around Coate Water as Bevis. He is known for his depiction through words of the countryside around him, he was a landscape painter in words, and struggled to find words to describe the wonder of the natural world, just as a painter might struggle to find the right paint to depict a landscape.

Jefferies was the first person to use the word wildlife rather than wild life, in his book Wildlife in a Southern County. The OED mentions the first used the term in 1879 by Jefferies, in some cases the cover of the book has Wildlife and others Wild Life. It wasn't until 1982 that the term wildlife was in common usage and appeared in a dictionary with Jefferies listed as the first person to coin the term.

I've included a painting of the Old Town Mill above and Jefferies farmhouse below

I think this is a photograph of Coate Water with the diving board on the right

And below this is 'Gamekeeper's Cottage, Hodson' by Frank Quentin, I wondered when it cam eto this point whether Mike thought that Frank had captured the idyllic nature of the cottage.

 

Mike used Tara Parker-Woolway's painting of Liddington Hill to compare a photo of the hill with Tara's painting. He wondered why she had transposed it, the reason being that Tara lives in Bourton and saw it from a different perspective.

Below is Turner's depiction of a train, Mike felt this was an abstract painting, but I can see identifiable things in it.

It was certainly a very thought provoking and fabulously illustrated talk. Thank you Mike. I look forward to the publication of your next book on Jefferies in 2021.

I hope this is a copy of the video of the talk, when you can find what Mike really said:

https://youtu.be/Tm9y3JVcjd8

 

From Seed to Steel: a talk by Joseph Ingleby

 For our last Zoom talk, we were very pleased to welcome Joseph Ingleby. whose sculpture, 'Turtle Storm' has resided in Queen's Park for the last 25 years. Fascinated by the sculpture, and the person behind it, I looked up Joseph, found his website, contacted him and asked if he would consider talking to us via Zoom. Based in Glasgow since 1989, there is no way we could have brought him to Swindon in person, but I am really pleased we were able to find out about his subsequent work.

Let's start with the sculpture 'Turtle Storm' seen below:

This was a response to the effects on a turtle colony of nuclear testing in the Pacific in the 1980s, it is composed of irregular natural forms including turtle shells, making an abstract work. It started life at Kelmscott Manor from 1989-94, and when Kelmscott was run by a Trust, a decision was made to have only artefacts on the premises made by William Morris. Turtle Storm was then donated by the Dufty family to Thamesdown who sited it in Queen's Park. Thank you to Angela Atkinson for this information in her 2015 blog piece on Queen's Park, which can be read here. Angela has written a blog piece in response to this talk, mainly about 'Turtle Storm', lots more information on the piece here.

Joe seems to have been influenced by natural forms, converting them into large steel structures, or not so large structures. I took a series of photos from the screen and took copious notes, starting with this one, 'Shelf Life' described as 'man made with an organic twist' by Joe

Flywheel seen below is a post graduate piece made from sheet metal

Spring Release below, made in 1992, is made from forged metal, and has much energy and movement in the piece

I don't think we were ready for 'Time Vessel' a breath taking commission on a large scale, it's a plate copper sculpture reminiscent of a ripening seed pod and can be found in Alloa, commissioned by Clackmannanshire Council.

This podded fern was commissioned by Sustrans

'Slipstream' was commissioned by Scottish Enterprise, Lanarkshire for South Lanarkshire Council, and now stands beside the river Clyde at Dalmarnock Bridge, Rutherglen, Glasgow, as you can see, it's lit at night.

Not all pieces are very large, Greta's Star celebrating his daughter's birth, is a copper sculpture

Joe starts with drawings, he showed us the drawings made before 'Turtle Storm' and also for

'Waterland' about freshwater life, and below, the scale models for the resulting sculpture in Nottingham

Joe also talked about the River Wall sculpture which is opposite Slipstream, there are lots of photos online, and it's a large piece, click here to see it, and lots of other images of Joe's work

We were then privileged to hear about Joe's latest work for Lerwick, Shetland, shown above are preparatory drawings, and below scale models of the abstracted guillemot's egg

and as seen below cut open to reveal elements of Shetland

For the definitive, accurate version of the talk, please click on the link here:

https://youtu.be/xOBwohIseD8

Thank you once again Joe for a fantastic talk.

 This was the information Joe gave us to publicise the talk:

 'From Seed to Steel' Joseph Ingleby is a sculptor working in metal, his work informed by an interest in nature and its uneasy relationship with the man-made. Based at Glasgow Sculpture Studios since 1989, Joe makes both large-scale works for outdoor public spaces, as well as smaller pieces for exhibition and interiors.Sculptures in the public realm are site-specific and draw on themes that reflect both historical and contemporary aspects. It is these‘hidden histories’ with their rooted points of reference, giving clues to the nature of the place, that he sees as the focus for the creation of his public artworks. In this talk,Joe will retrace his creative journey since the making of‘Turtle Storm’ in 1986, giving insight to his methodology and his artistic development as well as the importance of drawing to his practice. He will also consider how he works on a practical level–the materials he uses and how he constructs his sculptures. Illustrating how the commissioning process happens with its various key stages, Joe will show examples of some of his public work, as well as the small-scale gallery work that is the bedrock of his practice, enabling a constantly evolving approach of focus and refinement.Joe trained at West Surrey College of Art and Design, Farnham (now University College for the Creative Arts) graduating in 1986, and then at the Slade School of Fine Art, London,in 1988. In 1989, seeking affordable workshop and studio space, he moved to Glasgow and has developed his work at the GSSsince then. He has exhibited and had commissioned work located across the UK. Significant major awards include from the Pollock-Krasner Foundation, New York, in 1996and the Gottlieb Foundation, New York in 2013.