Civil War in Wigan

On Saturday, while we were in town, we went to watch a display by the Lieutenant-Colonel John Lilburne’s Regiment of Foote, part of the Sealed Knott Society, based around the Battle of Wigan Lane, took place on 25 August 1651, during the third phase of the Civil War. It wasn’t a major battle, but the outcome was significant. The Parliamentarians led by Robert Lilburne, the older brother of John, one of the leaders of the Levellers, defeated a force of Royalists led by the Earl Of Derby. According to the BBC History website:

In August 1651, King Charles II arrived in Worcester with a mostly Scottish army and summoned all royalists to join him against the new republican government of Oliver Cromwell. The Earl of Derby raised about 1,500 royalists in Lancashire and the Isle of Man and set off south.

The Earl was met at Wigan on 25 August by the parliamentarian army of Robert Lilburne, who had about 600 infantry and 60 dragoons, but who was expecting another 3,000 men to arrive very soon……..

……….. The defeat of the royalists at the battle of Wigan Lane cut off the supply of volunteers going to join Charles II at Worcester and ensured that he would be heavily outnumbered when confronted by Cromwell a few days later. And indeed on 3 September Charles was crushingly defeated.

The Earl of Derby was wounded, but escaped. His major General, a member of the local gentry, Sir Thomas Tyldesley, was captured and executed. A monument in his memory was erected on Wigan Lane in 1679, and still stands today on the corner of Monument Road.

So, on Saturday Wigan was “invaded” by a small force of Parliamentarians who occupied the lawns on The Weind

marched behind the drums onto the old Market Place

demonstrated their pike drill

the use of their muskets

(there were even musketeers stationed on top of the tower of the Parish Church)

and mingled with the crowd, answering questions about the Civil War, the troops, their costumes and their weapons.

The event climaxed with a skirmish between a small force of Parliamentarians and a group of Royalists on the piazza in front of the new Wigan Life Centre

The Roundheads, led by Colonel Robert Lilburne,

were victorious, and Sir Thomas Tyldesley was captured

and then executed by firing squad.

The victorious Parliamentary forces then marched off the battlefield

During the Civil War Lancashire was very much a rural backwater under the dominance of the feudal lords who formed the backbone of the King’s supporters. There were some towns, like Bolton, which were Parliamentary strongholds, but Wigan was stoutly Royalist and the town’s motto – “Ancient and Loyal” – was allegedly awarded by the king in recognition of this support. Despite this Wigan was the home town of Gerard Winstanley, leader of the Diggers one of the most radical movements to emerge during the Civil War. Today, the popular sentiment is pro-Royalists, based on a simplistic, romantic admiration of the “Cavaliers”. And that was reflected by some cheers amongst the crowd for the Royalists .

Personally, my sympathies lie unreservedly with the “Roundheads” and the Levellers, the radicals in the New Model Army, led by men like John Lilburne (Robert’s Brother) and Thomas Rainsborough, and the Diggers. No “divine right of kings” for me, where everyone knows their place and thanks God for it. Without the victory of the parliamentary forces, England, and Britain, would have remained a feudal backwater. And the Levellers and Diggers are part of a true radical tradition that laid the foundation of the democratic rights we hold so dear today.

 

"I desire that those that had engaged in it should speak, for really I think that the poorest he that is in England hath a life to live as the greatest he”

Thomas Rainsborough, at the Putney Debates October 1647

 

"Was the earth made to preserve a few covetous, proud men to live at ease, and for them to bag and barn up the treasures of the Earth from others, that these may beg or starve in a fruitful land; or was it made to preserve all her children?"

Gerrard Winstanley The New Law of Righteousness, 1649

Day out in Hebden Bridge

Hebden Bridge is a small village tucked away in a valley between steep hills in the Yorkshire Pennines. It was an industrial town of textile mills which originally developed due to a plentiful supply of running water needed to power the machinery.

Like most textile towns in Lancashire and Yorkshire, its industry declined in the 1960’s and 70’s. However, unlike most of the other cotton and wool communities, it got a new lease of life when it was colonised by artists, writers and “New Age” types in the 1970’s and 80’s. Today it’s a thriving tourist “honey pot” with art galleries, independent shops, cafes and restaurants and a sever lack of parking!

We decided to have a day out there on Saturday. Knowing that parking is a problem, and that its not an easy drive down the narrow’ winding roads that run along the Calder valley, we decided to go by train. There’s a station at Hebden Bridge on the line that runs from Manchester to Halifax and beyond, with a regular service with trains from Manchester about every 20 minutes. The train fare from Wigan was about £17, but by booking two tickets, one to the last station on the line in Greater Manchester (Rochdale or Littleborough) and then another one from there to the final destination, we were able to make a substantial saving as the maximum fare between any two stations in Greater Manchester is £3-90. I don’t know why the full “normal” fare can’t reflect the subsidised fare for travel within the county boundary.

Getting off the train at our destination was like stepping back into the past. When the train station at Hebden Bridge was renovated in 1997 the signage was changed to the style used by the Lancashire and Yorkshire railway before the days of British Rail.

We walked the short distance along the Rochdale canal from the train station to the centre of the village and had a wander round the streets lined with old, traditional stone buildings.

The original community was the village of Heptonstall, a steep climb up on the hillside. But a settlement developed in the valley around the old bridge over the River Calder. It has been a major crossing point since medieval times and although there are now two new bridges capable of carrying modern traffic, the old packhorse bridge, built around 1510, is still standing and can be crossed by foot.

It’s only a small town so it doesn’t take too long to explore unless you browse, as we did, in the shops and galleries, of which Hebden Bridge has more than its fair share. Due to the tourist trade it has considerably more shops than most other villages of the same size. It’s more akin to “honeypot” towns in the National Parks such as the Lake District and Yorkshire Dales than the Yorkshire and Lancashire Pennines. Even the old mill in the centre of town has been converted into shops and a cafe.

It was noticeable that other than a branch of Boots, a recently opened Rohan franchise and the main banks, the town was devoid of all the usual chains that dominate the high streets in just about every town in the UK. There were plenty of coffee shops and tea rooms but no branches of Starbucks, Costa Coffee and the like. This must be a deliberate policy, and it’s not a bad one.

After mooching round the shops and galleries and grabbing something to eat we went for a short walk along the Rochdale canal. It’s lines with old mills and other former working buildings, many of which have been converted to new uses.

Having spent a pleasant few hours in the town we headed back to the station and caught the train back to Manchester.

There are a number of potential walks starting from the village and I think I’ll be returning in the near future. Hebden Bridge has been designated as a “Walkers Welcome Town”. As part of this there are way marked trails  and other facilities for walkers. There are a couple of routes I quite fancy following – up to and along Hardcastle Crags and, more strenuous, up Stoodley Pike.

Marianne Faithfull. “Innocence and Experience” at Tate Liverpool

Over the last few years the Tate have let a number of celebrities loose amongst their collection to select works to put on display at the Gallery on the Albert Dock in Liverpool. Exhibitions have been curated by the designer Wayne Hemingway, the Poet Laureate Carol Ann Duffy and the hat designer Philip Treacy. The latest celebrity to have been given the opportunity to choose works to put on display is Marianne Faithfull and the resulting exhibition DLA Piper Series: Innocence and Experience, is being shown at Tate Liverpool until 2 September.

I called in to have a look while I was in Liverpool the other week. There was an interesting, eclectic selection of works on display reflecting Marianne’s influences and experiences. There were photographs by Robert Mapplethorpe including one of a young Marianne taken in the 1960’s, paintings by Francis Bacon, Lucien Freud, Peter Blake, David Hockney and William Blake (the exhibition takes its name from one of his books of poetry) amongst others and sculptures by Man Ray and René Magritte. . Apparently the works were selected in conjunction with John Dunbar, who was her husband at the time she met Mick Jagger, in the 1960s. To be honest I’d never heard of him but the publicity for the exhibition mentions that he was the founder of the Indica Gallery. According to Wikipedia

Indica Gallery was a counterculture art gallery in Mason’s Yard (off Duke Street), St. James’s, London, England during the late 1960s, in the basement of the Indica Bookshop co-owned by John Dunbar, Peter Asher and Barry Miles. It was supported by Paul McCartney and hosted a show of Yoko Ono‘s work in November 1966 at which Ono first met John Lennon.

Indica folded in just two years, after which Dunbar became an artist and exhibited work alongside Peter Blake and Colin Self.

I wonder to what extent Marianne was involved in curating the exhibition. I suspect John Dunbar was the dominant partner when it came to selecting the works.

Some of the works were quite disturbing. Two were paintings by Marlene Dumas. Lucy, in which the head of a dead woman with a gash across her neck fills the canvas, and  Stern, a very similar work, in this case based on the photograph taken of Ulrike Meinhof, the Red Army Faction, after she had died in her prison cell (she was either murdered or committed suicide depending on who you believe), published in the German magazine of the same name. Another was a photograph by Nan Goldin entitled Greer and Robert on the bed, NYC (1982), The two subjects are clearly drug addicts, the woman in particular

Greer, whose supine body extends through the centre of the frame to the left side, gazes blankly in the direction of the camera. There are dark shadows beneath her eyes; one skinny hand clutches the wrist of the other arm as if to support it; she is lost in contemplation of something not accessible to the viewer. (Source: Tate website)

One work that caught my eye was in the corner of the first room. There were a number of glass tetrahedrons in a random pile inside a perspex box. There was a light source underneath directing  a beam of light through the tetrahedrons which scattered the light rays and creating interesting patterns on the adjacent walls, floor and ceiling. I thought it was very effective

I was surprised when I discovered that it had been created by Yoko Ono; the first of her works that I’d seen.

Parts of a Lighthouse 1956-6 by Yoko Ono

Also included in the exhibition was a 12-minute film directed by Derek Jarman in 1979 to promote Marianne Faithfull’s album “Broken English”. The subject of the title song is Ulrike Meinhof, who is depicted in Marlene Dumas Stern.

The Crown Hotel, Liverpool

This very distinctive Grade II listed building is one of the first things you see when you leave Lime Street Station in Liverpool. On the corner of Lime Street and Skelhorne Street, it’s a rare example of a British Art Nouveau building.

Art Nouveau was very much a continental movement, reflecting the rise of a dynamic new middle class and Nationalist movements trying to make their mark in countries such as France, Belgium, Austria, Hungary, Czechoslovakia and Finland at the end of the 19th and beginning of the 20th Centuries. In Britain we had the Arts and Crafts Movement and the work of Rennie Mackintosh, but, in their own time, they had a limited audience for their work. And classic AN style buildings are few and far between in Britain. But the Crown Hotel is one of them.

According to the Liverpool Daily Post

It’s a Victorian toff of a pub that’s been dressed to kill to make it welcome for the passing train trade brigade.

After a little research I came across a page on the BBC website that reveals that the pub was built in 1859 in the neo-Classical style typical of many Victorian era buildings.

Picture source: BBC Website

It was remodelled in 1905 in the Art Nouveau style when it was taken over by Walker’s of Warrington and looks quite different than its original appearance. It has fancy bow windows with stained glass on both sides facing the street,

“lunette” windows with an elaborate surrounding on the top floor

and ornate signs with Art Nouveau style lettering.

I’ve never ventured inside the pub, but I understand that its also quite ornate with oak panelling, stained glass and a gilded plaster ceiling. I’ll have to pop in for a look next time over in the ‘pool.

Abbot Hall at Fifty

I can’t believe that we only discovered this superb gallery, an hour’s drive away,  a month ago. I came across it by accident when exploring the Art Guide app I’d installed on my iPad just after Easter and discovered they were holding an exhibition of watercolours by Turner and his contemporaries. That was coming to the end of it’s run and while we were there I found out about the next exhibition being held to mark the 50th anniversary of the Gallery’s opening consisting of of works from their collection selected by members of the public, artists and supporters.

The Abbot’s collection has quite a different emphasis to that of most galleries in the region. The great municipal galleries in cities such as Manchester, Liverpool and Leeds were opened during the Victorian age and, as a consequence the core of their collections consists of examples of art from that period. They started with a collection and built their Galleries to accommodate them. The Abbot, however, started with a building that had been restored and converted into a gallery and then had to collect works to fill it. So they began to collect contemporary works, some donated, some purchased, and paintings from the Georgian period, including works by local lad George Romney, who became a fashionable portrait painter. They also have a collection of 18th & 19th Century Watercolours, many Lakeland landscapes, and works by John Ruskin, who lived in the Lake District at Brantwood on Lake Coniston, at the end of his life.

Their collection of modern and contemporary works is excellent. They have paintings, drawings, prints and a few sculptures by the likes of Frank Aurbach, Francis Bacon, Lucien Freud, Elizabeth Frink, Barbara Hepworth,  Patrick Heron, David Hockney, Henry Moore, Ben Nicholson, Bridget Riley, Stanley Spencer, Sean Scully and many others, some well known, some less so.

Oval Form, Trezion (1962-3) by Barbara Hepworth – on the lawn in front of the gallery entrance

So we had to go back and have a look at the exhibition and took the opportunity last week when I was having a few days off work. Unfortunately the gallery do not allow photographs to be taken, but they do have a resource on their website here where selected works can be viewed.

The first works were being displayed in the entrance hall. An attractive painting by Winifred Nicholson Candle at a Window (1960) was hung by the side of the cash desk where you pay your entrance fee and facing it was a still life by the Scottish Colourist, John Peploe Still Life with Tulips and Oranges (1925). In many ways they were quite similar – colourful still lives painted in an impressionistic style. To the right of the cash desk there was a print by Picasso and at the end of the hall there was a small bronze sculpture by Elizabeth Frink, Harbinger Bird II (c. 1963).

Image source ; Abbot Hall gallery

The bulk of the exhibits were in the three of the main rooms on the first floor. The first room contained portraits. They included some from the Georgian period and others from the Modern collection.  I particularly liked Modesty (c 1781) by the Swiss-Austrian female painter, Angelica Kauffman, the Portrait of Jimmy Newmark (1943) by David Bomberg and Portrait of Marjorie Gertler (c 1925) by Mark Gertler.

In the second room there were Modern works including pictures by St Ives artists Bryan Winter, Patrick Heron, Roger Hilton and Terry Frost. There was a large painting by Tony Bevan Horizon (1998) which presents an unusual view of a couple of heads – looking up their nostrils! He’s only used one colour of paint – red – and charcoal. I thought it was very effective. The Gallery have used it in their publicity for the exhibition (see top of post), but to appreciate it you really need to see it “in the flesh”.

Image source ; Abbot Hall gallery

The third room contained landscape paintings by artists including Turner,  Lowry and Edward Lear (born 200 years ago on 12 June), who, although most well known as a writer of nonsense verse was principally an accomplished artist.

Windermere From Wansfell (1850) by Edward Lear Source: Abbot Hall Gallery

I was also impressed by the four photographs of a snow and ice sculpture created by Andy Goldsworthy – Slits Cut into Frozen Snow, Stormy… Blencathra, Cumbria, 12 February 1988. They were all taken within a few hours of each other, yet create very different moods as the light and weather conditions had changed during the course of the day (as is not untypical for the Lake District). The photos formed a permanent record of a very transient work

There were very few other works from the exhibition in another one of the rooms upstairs, including a painting by Sean Scully and a print by Henry Moore.

Image source ; Abbot Hall gallery

There were very few works in the exhibition I didn’t like. Their collection, although it doesn’t contain many “masterpieces” shows what can be achieved with some commitment, determination and imagination.

Other modern works were on display in the other couple of rooms on the first floor. On the ground floor the Gallery were showing their collection of watercolours by John Ruskin and paintings by George Rowley and other Georgian artists were hung in the two restored period rooms. The Great Picture a large scale triptych, was also on display. It was commissioned by Lady Anne Clifford in 1646 who counted Appleby Hall amongst her many other possessions. It’s a remarkable example of Elizabethan art.

It was another very enjoyable visit. We’ll definitely be going back soon. I’m particularly looking forward to the exhibition of works by Hughie O’Donoghue that they’re holding later this year (28 September – 22 December 2012).

Blackwell, Arts and Crafts House

It’s been a busy week. On Wednesday we went up to Cumbria. In the morning we went to see the latest exhibition at the Abbot Hall Gallery and the, in the afternoon, drove the few miles over to Blackwell, the Arts and Crafts house near to Bowness that’s also owned by the Lakelands Art Trust.

Built at the turn of the 20th Century as a holiday home for the Mancunian Brewery tycoon, Edward Holt,  on a hill overlooking Lake Windermere, its a superb example of a house built in the English Arts and Crafts Movement style. The architect was Mackay Hugh Baillie Scott and, according to the Blackwell website

Blackwell offered him the opportunity to put his ideas on the use of space, light and texture into practice on a grand scale and, perhaps, to experiment in ways which might not have been possible had the property been intended as the client’s main home, rather than a holiday home.

The house is orientated east west with the main windows on the south side to capture the light, although the best views are to the west, towards Lake Windermere and the fells.

I guess the holidaying occupants were not too interested in sitting staring at the views when they were inside the house. The priority seems to have been to get the light in. However, the opportunity to sit and admire the view is available in the Drawing room at the south end of the house. They could also enjoy the view while sitting on the terrace.

The exterior of the house is not particularly exceptional. I guess the best description of it’s style is “vernacular” with it’s stuccoed walls and steep pitched roof. There is certainly no symmetry or deliberate, harmonious Palladian proportions. Baillie Scott’s primary concern seems to have been designing a house that worked – a case of “form following function” and this has determined the shape of the building and the size and positioning of windows which from outside appear to be placed almost at random.

Although the exterior is relatively plain, but looking closely, the application of philosophy of the Art and Crafts Movement to create beautiful objects can be seen in the intricate decoration of the drainpipes.

and the Gothic style front door

The main priority of the design of the house was the interior, which has been exceptionally well restored by the Trust. They were lucky in that many of the original features have been preserved and the Trust have acquired furniture, objects and fine art consistent with Baillie Scott’s original designs and ideas about the layout so that the interior (downstairs at least) probably looks very much as the architect intended.

It wasn’t permitted to take photographs inside – although you can download some photographs from the Trust’s website here. But one Blogger, who’s an architect, has managed to get away with it and there are some good pictures and commentary here. He also visited and photographed another Arts and Crafts house, Broad Leys, designed by Charles Voysey which is nearby. It’s interesting to see how they compare.

The centrepiece of the house is the Medieval inspired great hall. Although the medieval and Elizabethan influence is clear to see – half timbered, it even has a small “minstrel’s gallery”- there are many “Art Nouveau” style features – the peacock frieze on the upper part of the wall at the end nearest the dining room, the copper lampshades, stained glass and the magnificent fireplace in it’s  “inglenook”. Inglenooks are recessed fireplaces almost forming a small room within a room. These must have been a speciality of Baillie Scott as these are exceptional features in all the main downstairs rooms. He incorporates windows and seating and they must have been very cosy places to sit and read or talk on a cold damp Lakeland day.

The design of the fireplace in the hall and in the dining room is a blend of modern and traditional. The surround is very modern with interlocking dark and light stones which slot together like pieces of a jigsaw, but he has used Delft style tiles to surround the grate.

The dining room has a very dark decor, which reminded me very much of those in Rennie Mackintosh’s reconstructed house at the Hunterian Museum in Glasgow and his “House for an Art Lover”. Besides the fireplace, the other outstanding feature was the hand printed hessian wall covering. It’s amazing that it is still in such wonderful condition after all these years.

My favourite room was the white drawing room at the west end of the house. This is a very “modern” rather than traditional room – very “Art Nouveau”. Light floods in and there is a magnificent view over Lake Windermere and the Coniston fells. There’s another beautiful recessed fireplace and I particularly liked the ceiling and the spindly columns with the decorated capitals, which all seemed to be different.

I found the following picture of the fireplace in the drawing room on Wikipedia.

Picture source: geograph.org.uk via Wikipedia (The copyright on this image is owned by Rob Farrow and is licensed for reuse under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 2.0 license.

I thought there were many similarities with Rennie Mackintosh’s House for an Art Lover which we visited last year

and also his Hill House (now owned by the National Trust for Scotland)

with the vernacular style exteriors and with a very similar approach to interior design.

Les Arbres à Bleu

This was another exhibit I particularly liked at the Cotton – Golden Threads exhibition at the Whitworth Gallery.

The work of Aboubakar Fofana, it was a forest created from rolls of cotton cloth all dyed with indigo in different patterns and standing on a “beach” of sand. Scattered on the beach were loofahs, again dyed with indigo.

There are some details about the work and the artist on the exhibition blog :

Aboubakar Fofana is a calligrapher, artist and textile designer. Born in Bamako, Mali, he lived in France for over thirty years but is now based back in Bamako.

Using organic fibres and natural dyes, he is committed to preserving and revitalizing Mali’s nearly lost tradition of natural indigo and vegetable dyeing. Profoundly concerned with maintaining Mali’s cultural heritage, in acquiring his skills he sought out the country’s remaining textile masters.

There’s an interview with the artist on Soundcloud

I was particularly interested in the use of indigo in this work as I’ve recently finished reading Colour by Victoria Findlay. The book, which I didn’t find completely satisfying, contains chapters on all the colours of the rainbow, as defined by Isaac Newton, which included indigo.

Indigo is a vegetable dye that originated in India and has been used for dying cloth for hundreds, if not thousands, of years. It’s the colour of blue jeans. This is it’s chemical structure:

This is the Indigo plant from which the dyestuff is derived

Image source Wikipedia

The book is largely a series of mini travelogues where the author sets off on one or more journeys connected with each colour. In the case of indigo she travelled to India trying to find the “last indigo plant”. She found that the plant was no longer cultivated in it’s country of origin. Much  of the indigo used today is manufactured artificially.

Drop Sari by Liz Rideal

While we were in Manchester on Tuesday we called into the Whitworth Gallery. I wanted to have another look at the two exhibitions The Devil’s Wall and Cotton – Golden Threads, both of which finish this weekend, so it was the last chance to see them.

One of the exhibits in the Cotton exhibition that I particularly liked was a video installation by Liz Rideal. A series of images of fabrics, India and textile production processes were projected onto four white saris hanging from the ceiling and gently wafting in a breeze created by a fan. I thought it was very effective.

The video was flanked by two other works by the artist – Ghost Sari i and ii, monotype prints of of crumpled saris printed on Japanese paper from and a display of vintage sample books featuring Indian fabrics – some of which are actually featured in the Drop Sari film.

There’s an interview with the artist here

Another version of the work, Light Curtain, was also projected on the outside of the gallery during the night. Unfortunately I never got the chance to see this.

“Miss Julie” at the Royal exchange

Photo from Royal Exchange Flickr page – click picture for slideshow

We went to see the Royal exchange’s production of Strindberg’s “Miss Julie”, a new translation by the playwright David Eldridge, on Tuesday. It was coming towards the end of its run but it had had some very good reviews so we wanted to catch it before it finished. We hadn’t been to the theatre for a while, so it was a good treat.

The plot is summed up on the Royal Exchange’s website

Sweden, 1894. Midsummer night’s celebrations are in full swing but the Count’s daughter, the beautiful and imperious Miss Julie, feels trapped and alone. Downstairs in the servants’ kitchen, handsome and rebellious footman Jean is feeling restless. When they meet a passion is ignited that soon spirals out of control. Strindberg’s masterpiece caused a scandal when first produced – and has been hugely popular ever since – for its searingly honest portrait of the class system and human sexuality.

There’s been a revival in interest in “upstairs, downstairs” dram on the TV with two series of Downton Abbey and a revival of Upstairs Downstairs on the BBC. Although these series have been very popular I’ve found them unrealistic. Although I enjoyed much of the first series of Downton, mainly due to the excellent acting, I thought the storylines started to get rather silly towards the end of it’s run and never bothered watching the second series.

Miss Julie paints quite a different picture of relationships between the classes and sexes in 19th Century Sweden. At the beginning Miss Julie very much has the upper hand as would be expected. She’s the aristocrat and Jean is a household servant. Of course, this is a reversal of the usual relationship between the sexes in that period, where the woman is subservient to the man. Class trumps sex. However, very quickly the tables are turned and by the end of the play the servant is very much in control. From a socialist perspective the situation is ambiguous though. It’s good to see the worker on top, but, on the other hand, the man’s treatment and subsequent domination of the woman is disconcerting to say the least.

The play is, effectively, a three hander. There are three roles – Miss Julie, played by Maxine Peake, Jean, the valet and his fiancé, the cook, Kristen. There was no interval and the two main actors were on stage for almost all of the 100 minutes duration. They must have been exhausted by the end, particularly given the very intense nature of the play.

All three actors were very good. And I thought Maxine Peake was magnificent. She really got across the character. Dominant at the beginning, broken, confused and subservient by the end.  And I’d have to agree with Jean’s comment early in the play – Miss Julie was a very handsome woman.

Sappho by Charles Mengin

Sappho by Charles Mengin (1877) Picture source: Wikipedia

While I was in Manchester on Saturday I called into the Manchester City Art Gallery. Unfortunately my favourite rooms were all closed. The Modern and Contemporary Art galleries are undergoing some major alterations and the room with the Lowry and Valette paintings were closed to the public for the afternoon for a private function* . Although I was disappointed I had a look round some of the other rooms which mainly display more “historic” art.

Given it’s origins, the Manchester Gallery has a particularly large collection of Victorian art. Most of it doesn’t appeal to me, except for some of the Pre-Raphaelite pictures and a few other works. I’m not particularly keen on meticulous, photographic, landscapes, mythological and historical scenes and thinly disguised pornography that typify painting from this period. In general, they’re not to my taste. However, there are some pictures on display that I like. One example being Charles Mengin’s painting of Sappho. I’m not alone. Apparently the postcard of the painting is one of the top sellers in the Gallery bookshop.

Many Victorian era paintings include naked or half naked women. Although they’re usually  part of a mythological or historical scene, there was really only one reason why they were painted – titillation. This painting of Sappho from 1877 was intended to fulfil that same purpose. But I think that it has transcended the original intention. There is no doubt that it is an erotic picture. But, to me, the subject comes across as a powerful woman rather than a victim.

I think that her expression is supposed to portray her sadness at the loss of her lover, but there’s something about it, and her pose, that seems to suggest something else – pity, perhaps, or even contempt. You could read it as a sulk or even a sneer. To me, she seems to be more in control than being controlled.  I’m sure that definitely isn’t what the artist intended, and what do I know. But that’s the effect the work has on me.

I haven’t been able to find anything about Mengin, other than he was born in Paris, painted in the “Academic” style and exhibited at the Paris Salon in the late 1870’s. Sappho seems to be his only painting of note

 

*I wasn’t happy about the latter, especially as it’s the second time it’s happened when I’ve visited the Gallery recently. A commercial event preventing visitors seeing some of the Gallery’s most popular paintings. A sign of the times? But I’ll not rant about.