National Museums Liverpool Blog - Monday, February 26, 2007

I’ve just been acquainting myself with Merchant Palaces, our photographic exhibition of Wirral and Liverpool mansions, currently on show at the Lady Lever Art Gallery. I was interested to discover that Dawpool in Thurstaston, the magnificent home of Sir Thomas Henry Ismay, was designed by Richard Norman Shaw the architect responsible for the White Star Line offices in James Street. I’ve always had a strange obsession with this candy striped masterpiece and yet again this morning its hooped turrets of copper and cream stirred me from my rush-hour induced slumber as I crept along the dock-road. Ever since I visited Liverpool, as a wide eyed 7 year old Boltonian, I’ve always had a sneaky feeling the White Star building actually has an edible façade. I remember looking longingly and almost salivating at the prospect of a huge building encased in chocolate and icing. So far I have resisted giving its auburn bricks a cheeky lick so I’d like to think there’s still a small chance it could be Liverpool’s equivalent of the Hansel and Gretel gingerbread house.

This got me wondering if there are any more buildings in Liverpool with culinary characteristics and I discovered the Radio City tower is in fact a marshmallow ripe for melting and the columns of the Walker Art Gallery bear more than a slight resemblance to sticks of coltsfoot rock. Ah, if only Lutyen’s Cathedral that Never Was had made it past the planning stage, Liverpool would have been home to an ice-cream sundae of mammoth proportions. 

The delicious White Star Line offices

Our renowned National Conservation Centre in Whitechapel Liverpool is the expert place for conserving fine paintings, but even they'd be hard pushed to make them appear quite as lifelike as photographer John Paul Pietrus has in this stunning Guardian recreation.

I couldn’t resist sharing these beautiful pictures of Coleen McLoughlin for those who missed the feature on Saturday. She may share her WAG initials with the Walker Art Gallery but this is taking it too far!

You've already heard about Wallace and Gromit and how they a going down a storm at Animated Adventures at World Museum Liverpool, but the older visitor should take the time to check out the other animation pods too.

The pods are all dedicated to different individual animators or their studios and their approach to developing a particular animation. Each one tells a different story and they are definitely worth a read if you are even remotely interested in the field. I've done a bit more hunting round on the web so you can see some of the work that's under the spotlight:

• A Barbaric Tale by Richard Vaucher
• Theme Planet by Michael Sormann
• Honey by Evan Cagle (whose website seems to be experiencing hiccups so I've linked elsewhere)
• D7 Peacemaker from D7 Studios
• Gene-Fusion AD 2310 by Banjax
• and last but not least, Kaze Ghost Warrior by Timothy Albee Animation.

One of the perks of this job - other than the obvious joy of working in a museum - is flexi time.  We always get back the hours we work which is very convenient when you fancy an early dart to the pub on a Friday or a Monday morning in bed. Not everyone is so blessed though - apparently we (sorry, you) give your employers £23 billion in free hours every year. So the TUC is running its annual 'Work your proper hours day' this Friday to encourage the UK's workforce to leave on time, take a proper lunchbreak etc.

One of the suggested activities is to pop to a museum in your lunchtime, so the 24 Hour Museum has put together lunchtime trails for several cities, including Liverpool. The Walker Art Gallery, World Museum Liverpool and National Conservation Centre are all close to the main shopping and business districts, all have cafes and are all more fun than sitting at your desk praying for home time.

A hole lot of fun in the docks

This morning I went on a special staff tour of the Manchester Dock dig site, led by project officer Mark Adams from the field archaeology unit. That's him on the right of the photo - the one with the high visibility jacket and hard hat!

You can get a rough idea of the site layout in this aerial photo. Since that was taken the team have been digging down to reveal a number of key features from around the old dockside, including machinery and the hydraulic system that moved the dock gates.

The internal dock gates at Manchester Dock have now been uncovered and Mark pointed out a number of masons' marks on the dock walls around them.

It's not just the structure of the dock itself that is of interest to the archaeologists, as the material that was used to backfill it is also part of the story of the site. Much of the Manchester Dock was filled with sandstone from the excavation of the Mersey tunnels. A number of sugar moulds have also been found in the fill material. While we were there, archaeologists Sarah Pevely and Helen Jones (in the hole at the front of the photo) uncovered some more.

By the way, in case you were wondering, there was no machinery operating on site today, which is why people were allowed in without safety jackets and hats.

Chinese New Year by Lizinha

Some Sundays, even living within ten minutes of your intended destination doesn't get you there for midday, especially if there's going to be loads of firecrackers and banging drums. Yesterday I wanted to photograph the Chinese New Year celebrations on Berry Street but didn't quite make it in time. Thanks to Lizinha, Pete Carr, Peter, Indigo Goat, Spectral Shift and ijob, I don't feel that I missed out.

Tim Brunsden at Liverpool Stories produced an excellent video of the events, while Art in Liverpool blogged about them.

Landscape with the Ashes of Phocion by Poussin

This Thursday the Independent will be giving away a colour poster of Poussin's 'Landscape with the ashes of Phocion' as part of their British Art Treasures series. One free in each copy of the paper.

Wolohan Marionette Theatre. Accession number MLL.2005.37.29

The start of the Chinese Year of the Pig was celebrated in style across the city yesterday, and there are more cultural events planned at our venues next weekend - check out the Merseyside Maritime Museum What's On page for more details.

Somehow I doubt that any of the celebrations looked quite like the party in this photograph of a pig marionette playing musical instruments with his wolf and cat friends!

Museum of Liverpool curator Kay Docherty tells me that the marionettes were part of the Wolohan Marionette Theatre. The family run theatre, originally operated by John and Margaret Wolohan from the 1920s, did many performances in Liverpool and the surrounding area for enraptured children and adults.
 
John Wolohan was a musician in the Philharmonic Orchestra and wrote and composed all of the music for the shows himself whilst the marionette costumes were handmade by Margaret. The family moved to the USA for a few years and continued their shows there.
 
Denis Wolohan, John and Margaret's son and his wife Pat assisted with the shows and later took over the running of the theatre in the 1960s, continuing to entertain children up until their recent retirement.
 
Denis and Pat very kindly donated a selection of their marionettes, photographs, props and stage backdrops to the collections of the Museum of Liverpool in 2005.

Accession number for this photograph: MLL.2005.37.29

We spent last Friday trying to kick some life into our 'Figures of 08' project. We put the project live in December but didn't have the time to give it a proper publicity push. Marc wrote about 'Figures of 08' previously, it's a capital of culture themed project that asks you to send us photographs of unintentional '08's that you come across. There's a slideshow and a google map of the photographs submitted so far.

Discussing how to kickstart our project, Marc showed me a trailer for the new Jim Carrey film 'The Number 23' on Friday. The film seems to be about a man who sees negative patterns in his life that always point to the number 23. I spent a pretty fruitless afternoon on Saturday looking for new '08's, it was annoying to walk out of the Maritime Museum and be confronted with what I now presume to be our nemesis number adorning the side of the pilot boat docked alongside.

Model of the Royal Yacht, the Mary Image courtesy of Liverpool Daily Post & Echo

This was a story which I, Stephen Guy, worked on as a young journalist.

In 1971 divers from a sub aqua club discovered by chance a remarkable wreck near the Skerries, a treacherous group of rocks off the north coast of Anglesey. Scattered over the seabed was all that remained of a ship that once carried the highest in the land – Britain’s first Royal Yacht, the Mary.

She was presented to Charles II by his allies the Dutch in 1660, the year he came to the throne. Britain had been in the grip of Lord Protector Oliver Cromwell since 1649. With the return of the monarchy, popular Charles and the people wanted to party. Bright colours replaced the drab hues that had dominated the Commonwealth world.

The Mary reflected the mood of the age. Her cabins were decorated with gold leaf. Her furniture was made from the finest leather and her figurehead was a unicorn. Charles used her for racing and later she was given to the Royal Navy to transport the great and the good. Not only was the Mary the first yacht outside Holland but she was the ancestress of the thousands of racing yachts and sailing dinghies sailing around Britain today.

Disaster struck in 1675 when she was wrecked on the Skerries, a notorious graveyard for ships. A total of 39 passengers and crew survived – 35 died, including the Earl of Meath. Survivors huddled two days on the rocks before being rescued.

Merseyside Maritime Museum supervised the salvage of items from this important wreck. A gold signet ring with an unidentified coat of arms was worn on the finger of a noble victim who perished in the cruel seas. A silver sword guard is all that is left of a deadly weapon once wielded with great skill. A large pewter plate with the crest of Charles II may have been used by the captain, William Burslow, who died trying to save Lord Meath. The pewter chamber pot was used by the upper classes – the common sailors relieved themselves over the side. A silver porringer bowl for drinking hot, spiced beverages is also in the collection with other silver items such as coins, a spoon and an ornate lion’s head which once graced the handle of a walking cane.

There's more on The Mary, and this model in particular, on our main site.

A new Maritime Tale appears every Saturday in the Liverpool Echo.

A book Royal Yacht Mary: The Discovery of the First Royal Yacht explores this intruiging saga and is now available in our online shop.