National Museums Liverpool Blog - Friday, September 22, 2006

'Anne Wortley, Later Lady Morton' (the portrait behind the rope above) is a new loan to the Walker Art Gallery from Tate Britain. It is a temporary replacement for our portrait of 'Henry VIII' loaned to the Tate’s Holbein in England exhibition, 28 September 2006 – 7 January 2007. It has been hung in Room One of the Walker alongside Jean Clouet's 'Princess Marguerite of Angouleme' and 'Queen Elizabeth I - The Pelican Portrait', attributed to Nicholas Hilliard.

The panel text that accompanies the painting states:

It portrays Anne Wortley, daughter of Sir Richard Wortley of Yorkshire, in formal dress as worn at the court of James I. It is a typical Jacobean portrait. It aims not to create a convincing idea of space, which is rather awkwardly reproduced in this portrait, but to focus in almost hypnotic detail on the elaborate costume, ruff, head-dress, jewellery and other accessories. For this reason such portraits are sometimes referred to nowadays as ‘curtains & carpets’ paintings. The different qualities of the brushwork on this portrait suggest that it was perhaps painted by several artists from one workshop, each specialising in a different area, and some trained in the Netherlands.

View an enlarged image of the painting on the Tate Collection's website.

Wenda Parkinson, Vogue 1951

Sunday 24 September is your last chance to see the Norman Parkinson exhibition at the Lady Lever Art Gallery. 'Portraits In Fashion' has received some excellent reviews (including this one) and is well worth a visit.

Read the 24 Hour Museum review and this North West Enquirer piece.

Carrying on the Museum of Liverpool subject, part of the new museum will look at the figures who have helped shape Liverpool. One of the people who will probably feature is Josephine Butler who, in case you don't know, was a social reformer and political campaigner who worked against slavery and child prostitution, for women’s rights and for higher education for women. 

The Women's Library in London has just opened an exhibition on prostitution which features Jospheine Butler, and this Guardian article tells you more about this remarkable and relatively unsung woman.

Lion railway locomotive

A new feature on the Museum of Liverpool website is the Land transport collection top ten, with a variety of vehicles from across the ages. Most of this popular collection is currently either in storage or on loan to other museums. However, it is hoped that we will be able to put some on display in the new Museum of Liverpool when that opens in 2010.

In the meantime you can see the AER motorcycle in the Reveal display at the National Conservation Centre (look up when you go in) and the famous Lion railway locomotive at the Museum of Science and Industry in Manchester.

If you look really closely you can see 'King of the world' Leo and Kate (just kidding)

It's all go at the Merseyside Maritime Museum. The Floating Palaces gallery, which looks at the golden age of travel on liners including poignant reminders of the Titanic and Lusitania disasters, is due to close soon and be replaced by a much bigger better gallery on the first floor of the museum.

The new gallery will explore the story of the sinking of the Empress of Ireland as well as the Titanic and Lusitania, highlighting new research and Liverpool connections. New material on display will include recent acquisitions such as a medal awarded to Able Seaman Leslie Morton, who rescued many of the survivors from the Lusitania. These will be shown alongside existing highlights from the collection, such as the huge model of the Olympic/Titanic.

In order for the changes to take place the Floating Palaces gallery will close on 1 October 2006, so you've got just over a week to go if you want to have a last look around. The new gallery is expected to open later in the year, we'll keep you posted when the date is confirmed.

Sunday's Observer included a feature on 'The best-kept arts secrets in Britain'.

DJ Rob Da Bank nominated 'Another Place' ('amazing to look at and you don't pay to get in'), whilst 'the second most intelligent man in Britain', Stephen Bayley, chose the Walker Art Gallery's 'Christ Discovered in the Temple' by Simone Martini.

'Not exactly a secret, but certainly a surprise, is Simone Martini's Christ Discovered in the Temple in Liverpool's Walker Art Gallery. I knew this exquisite little picture as a child, long before I ever visited Siena. Martini was one of that magnificent city's greatest painters, working at the fascinating moment when Gothic simplicity became Renaissance sophistication. There's the effulgence of tooled gold, the lapis, the vermilion, but there's also subtle psychology: a superb object and a brilliant image.

Marvellous how this gorgeous southern picture found its way, through proud merchants and shippers, to the gloom of 19th-century Merseyside. It hangs now in Lancashire as a strange and haunting refugee from faraway Tuscany, a sudden jolt of Renaissance beauty enjoyed to the distant noise of buses.'

A moment of peace in a hectic weekend

I feel I should apologise for the lack of new blog entries over the last couple of days. This is partly because, after weeks of feverish activity preparing for the Biennial opening weekend, we've now been unchained from our keyboards and allowed out to enjoy the Biennial in all its glory.

And what a weekend it has been. I've walked around so much I'm sure my legs must be at least an inch shorter and I've still only scratched the surface of what's on offer. Over the last few days I've heard Tracey Emin go meow (have a listen on the podcast of the John Moores 24 opening speeches), stroked the paw of a caged lion and seen more art than I could shake a very large stick at. 

I spent Friday afternoon exploring the Greenland Street galleries, including the Bloomberg New Contemporaries 2006 in the Coach Shed. If you go there on a sunny day then head up to the roof of the adjacent Blade Factory building, the light shining through the enclosure there is stunning, these photos really don't do it justice. Then after being dazzled by the light I found a very dark room downstairs with rather beautiful 'silent music'. I could have stayed there all day quite happily.

Martin Greenland is the first prizewinner for John Moores 24 with his painting 'Before Vermeer's Clouds'. A full online catalogue is available, showing all 52 paintings with artists' statements and biographies.

The exhibition opens to the public this Saturday, 16 September 2006, at the Walker Art Gallery, running until the end of the Biennial, 26 November 2006.

The other prizewinners announced are Matthew Burrows ('Baptism'), Graham Crowley ('Red Reflection'), Vincent Hawkins ('After Paul Nash'), James White ('In the Basement (Kit 10)').

Cape Farewell: Art and Climate Change opens this Saturday, 16 September 2006, continuing as part of Liverpool Biennial until 26 November 2006.

The exhibition is spread across several venues. Of our venues, the Walker and the Conservation Centre are participating, displaying works by Heather Ackroyd & Dan Harvey, Alex Hartley, David Buckland, Gautier Deblonde, Gary Hume and Nick Edwards.

Other works are in the Anglican Cathedral, Albert Dock and the Liverpool School of Art and Design, Hope Street (map).

To my shame I admit I have never been to Hope Street Festival, which this year takes place on Sunday 17 Sept. Reading the run down it's really hard not to be impressed. It's a free festival - and it's all in one street.

Mmmm.....food. Liverpool Real Ale Festival. Massage. Cartoons at the Phil. Jigs and reels. Jewellery. Trinkets to buy. Farmers' market. Mexican BBQ. That's me sold. See you Sunday - 11am till 5pm.