National Museums Liverpool Blog - Monday, November 09, 2009

Copyright Stephen Shakeshaft

It's competition time again and this month's picture comes courtesy of the rather wonderful exhibition Liverpool People by Stephen Shakeshaft, which is at the National Conservation Centre until 24 January 2010.

Have a look at this photograph from the exhibition - you can see a larger version on the exhibition website - and see if you can think of an amusing caption for it. Post your entry as a comment (please keep them clean) by the end of the day on Sunday 22 November and the winner will be notified the following week.

Stephen Shakeshaft himself has very kindly offered to judge this month's competition. The lucky winner will get a signed copy of his book 'No Illusions' which includes many of the pictures from the exhibition and more from Stephen's first 30 years as a newspaper photographer.

Sarah Jane Parsons in Bridlington, 1950. Image courtesy Liverpool Daily Post and Echo.

Homesickness is like seasickness – you only feel better once you’ve stopped travelling. I have suffered from both and hope I never experience them again.

Longing for home gnaws away at the soul and is almost impossible to eradicate. I found that it was just as much the loss of my cultural roots as the absence of family and friends.

The logistics of moving huge numbers of emigrants through Liverpool involved everything from supplying cabins to the plates they ate off – it was very big business indeed.

Around nine million people moved abroad through Liverpool between 1830 and 1930 making it probably the greatest emigration port in world history. It was often very emotional for the passengers as they left their old familiar homes behind for new lives in unknown countries.

Many descendants of those emigrants still have strong emotional attachments to Liverpool because it was the last place their families saw before taking the leap into the dark.

However, some did not like their new lives and returned home. There were a number of reasons for this including work and financial issues but often it was simply homesickness.

The new emigration gallery at Merseyside Maritime Museum focuses on many different aspects of this mass migration.

From the tail end of the era there is a fascinating model of the Blaco portable cabin from around 1920-30. They were made by F C Blackwell & Co of Crosby, Liverpool.

Portable cabins were used by shipping companies involved in emigration from the 19th century onwards. The detailed wood and metal demonstration model was used when shipping companies such as Cunard and Canadian Pacific employed Blaco cabins. They could be quickly installed to cater for individual needs of emigrants.

A wooden trunk was used by the Parsons family when they emigrated from Liverpool to the United States in 1906. Oliver Charles Parsons and his wife Sarah Jane were originally from Wakefield, Yorkshire.

After arriving in the USA they lived with their young family in Tennessee, Kentucky and Wyoming before returning to England in 1914.

Oliver died during the flu pandemic of 1918 and Sarah had to raise here five children alone. She kept the wood and metal trunk with its many memories until her death in 1965.

Photographs show Sarah at Bridlington in 1950 (pictured) and her daughter Minnie Chesters in 1954. Minnie was the couple’s eldest child and had emigrated with her parents.

A new Maritime Tale by Stephen Guy appears every Saturday in the Liverpool Echo. A paperback – Mersey Maritime Tales (£3.99) – is available from the museum, newsagents, bookshops or from the Mersey Shop website (£1.50 p&p UK).

 Our intrepid explorers prepare to enter the pyramid tomb

The public fascination with Ancient Egypt never seems to wane, as the opening of Howard Carter’s house as a museum in Egypt testifies. The British archaeologist’s most famous discovery was the tomb of the pharaoh Tutankhamun, and the house has been opened due to popular demand. A trip to Egypt is a little out of my reach at the moment, but I did recently have a little taste of the excitement an explorer might undoubtedly feel on entering an undisturbed ancient tomb to unravel its secrets and mysteries.

The occasion? I was part of a small audience for the dress rehearsal of ‘Ancient Egyptian Adventure – the Secret of the Jewelled Heart’ which is currently on its way to 63 selected schools in Knowsley, St Helens and Liverpool as part of a government initiative called Find Your Talent. The performance is just one part of a whole day of activities that pupils engage in on the theme of Ancient Egypt, but the great thing about it is that they get to follow the characters, intrepid explorer Jesse and archaeologist Dotty through a door and onto the stage set of a pyramid tomb! The whole show is totally immersive and there's been a great response so far with one head teacher calling it ‘outstanding’.

Ancient Egyptian Adventure is just one of the many Find Your Talent programmes currently being rolled out in the Liverpool city region, and I’ll be telling you more about others in the future. But don’t worry if you’re not part of the programme – you can still marvel at the wonder of ancient Egypt in our gallery at World Museum or learn about proverbs and witty sayings from ancient Egyptian society in our podcast.

Penguins are almost go at the warehouse. 'Look At Me' is front left. Image courtesy of Helen Burnley.

Those of you who live locally might already have heard about the imminent arrival of over 100 penguins to the streets and venues of Liverpool. Go Penguins! launches on 22 November, and National Museums Liverpool is providing homes for 13 of the happy but slightly homesick birds. They include 'Moon Waddler', aka Neil Flipstrong, at World Museum, while the Maritime is hosting 'Under the Sea' penguin. This photograph was taken at the secret penguin storage facility and shows another of our arrivals, 'Look at Me' (front left) along with some of his feathered friends.

Each of the birds has been created by either local artists, schools or community groups and adopted by a local organisation. Together they form A Winter's Trail which you'll be able to follow around the city centre, making Liverpool a proper Capital of Christmas.

As well as our usual programme of festive activities and events we'll be hosting a series of special penguin events that are guaranteed to keep the kids amused over the Christmas holidays. We're even creating a dedicated penguin shop at World Museum. There'll be more on our penguins and our other Christmas activities on our main site shortly. In the meantime there's more penguin information on the official Go Penguins! website.  

Update: Should have mentioned that some of the penguins have already been sighted in an Antony Gormley-esque arrangement on New Brighton beach (more on the Art in Liverpool website). Local comedian, Paul O'Grady, has also created his own, 'Owl Ma Penguin', and the BBC website has a slide show of some of the other designs you'll soon be seeing round and about.

BBC’s See Hear filmed at the International Slavery Museum last month as part of Black History Month. They brought a group of people with hearing impairments from London to see the museum for the first time.

You can watch their very moving response on BBC’s iplayer.

The Liverpool Cityscape by Ben Johnson

Even amidst a giant spider prowling the streets and a herd of superlambananas dotted across the city, Ben Johnson’s The Liverpool Cityscape stood out as a highlight of 2008.

Ben finished the vast painting in front of a live audience at the Walker Art Gallery early in the year. Thousands of visitors observed their city arriving on the canvas layer by layer through the intricate process the artist employed.

Once the painting was finished it took pride of place in the exhibition Ben Johnson’s Liverpool Cityscape 2008 and the World Panorama Series where it was joined by panoramas of Zürich, Jerusalem and Hong Kong and paintings representing Chicago and Paris.

Many of those who flocked to see the painting under completion and the stunning exhibition that followed have enjoyed taking part in the free events celebrating the astonishing work over the last few weeks. But don’t worry if you haven’t had a chance yet, the season of free events for all the family continues over the next couple of months. See the website for more details.

One of the events, We love Liverpool, is an opportunity for visitors to reminisce and share their memories of the city. If you can’t make it to the gallery but have got something you want share, please feel free to add it on the blog.

The events have been coordinated in partnership with the University of Liverpool.

Soldiers often send things to their loved ones at home. During the First World War they often sent embroidered postcards, some of which are now in National Museums Liverpool's collection. The postcards, known as 'World War One Silks', were mostly produced by French and Belgian women refugees and became extremely popular with British and American servicemen on duty in France. Further information about them is on this web page about Silks.

Some of the remembrance postcards that have already been made for our banner

This Saturday you are invited to make your own postcard in remembrance of those that gave their lives during the First and Second World Wars in a free drop-in workshop, 1-4pm in the Learning base in the basement of Merseyside Maritime Museum. If you leave your postcard with us we will include it in a banner which we hope to display in the The Liverpool Pals and the First World War exhibition in the Museum of Liverpool when it opens in 2011. At the workshop this weekend you will also have the chance to find out about life in the trenches and how to trace your family’s history through military records.

The Liverpool Pals and the First World War exhibition will tell the story of the First World War as experienced by the ordinary people of Liverpool, either through participation in the fighting - focussing on the story of the Liverpool Pals – or through involvement on the Home Front. The main emphasis of the exhibition will be the particular Liverpool aspects of the story, set in a national and international context.

Lord Derby recruited one of the first Pals battalions in England from Liverpool in August 1914 when he suggested that men would volunteer if they could remain with work colleagues, family or neighbours. In effect the social structure of Liverpool was transferred to the front line. This exhibition will confront the realities of the loss of 16,700 Liverpool men, how it happened, and how it impacted on – and in some cases devastated - Liverpool communities.

Details of all events this weekend are on the Merseyside Maritime Museum's events and activities page, including this workshop and a new roleplayer performance on Sunday, 'Never at sea - the Wren's story'.

Jenni Whiteside and Sarah Lynch looking glamerous at the Wirral Tourism Awards

Forget the Oscars and the Golden Globes they’re for tanned people with abnormally white teeth. Last night the Wirral Tourism Awards celebrated the real people who make a difference to our days out.

Two members of staff from the Lady Lever Art Gallery were rightly rewarded for the brilliant work they do on a daily basis.

Sarah Lynch, admin assistant won the Unseen Hero Award.  This award is given to staff who show a positive, committed and willing attitude to their organisation and who demonstrate positive communication skills.

Jenni Whiteside, assistant manager in the Lady Lever Art Gallery gift shop was runner up for the Most Supportive Supervisor Award. People nominated for this award demonstrate outstanding contribution to staff development, are a positive role model, and have motivating skills.

Both Jenni and Sarah looked lovely and are certainly a credit to National Museums Liverpool. Well done ladies we’re very proud of you!

Head of objects conservation,Vivien Chapman, (left) inspecting the flag in the textile conservation studio

This special Rainbow Flag was recently donated to the Museum of Liverpool's permanent collections and will be displayed pride of place in the People's City gallery in the new Museum of Liverpool when it opens in 2011.

This flag represents a very important first in Liverpool. It was flown above Liverpool Town Hall for the first time for the International Day Against Homophobia on 17 May 2009. It is just one of the many objects with amazing stories which curators seek out to ensure contemporary issues and events in the city are represented for the future. International Day Against Homophobia marks the day in 1990 when the World Health Organisation took homosexuality off its list of mental illnesses. It is hard to believe that until relatively recently this was still the case but with recent homophobic attacks in Liverpool it is all too apparent that there is a long way to go in challenging prejudice and intolerance.

The flag was kindly donated by Liverpool City Council. It is a fitting time to add it to the collection at the start of Liverpool's annual Homotopia festival. National Museums Liverpool has always supported the festival and will be holding a free talk about the secret language of Polari at 2pm this Saturday at Merseyside Maritime Museum as part of the programme of events. Further details are on the Sailing Proud page on the Merseyside Maritime Museum's website.

You can see more photos in the Rainbow Flag set on Flickr.

The Singh Twins next to Ranbindra's painting 'Oh Come All Ye Re-eds'

Is football a new religion? Can being a female artist be an advantage in some cultures? These are just some of the subjects covered in a brief interview I did with acclaimed local artists The Singh Twins. I chatted with Rabindra and Amrit at the private view of the Walker Art Gallery's latest exhibition The Rise of Women Artists, where Ranbindra's painting 'Oh Come All Ye Re-eds' is on display. One of the main things I was interested to find out was whether they ever actually define themselves as 'women artists' or if they didn't think about gender at all.

Amrit said; 'I think personally as artists we’ve never thought of ourselves as women, we’ve never defined ourselves as ‘British female artists’. I think that the gender issue is not really important, as ultimately I think the art should speak for itself and the quality of the work. Therefore it doesn’t matter if you’re a man or a woman.

But I think that it is important in the context of if you consider throughout history where there has been prejudice towards female artists then obviously that is something that needs to be re-addressed. I think there should be more incentives to support female artists especially since many of them are juggling a million things; family life and other commitments around the work they are trying to do. And it’s not always easy to take up a career in art alongside that and to commit to all your other daily activities. Essentially though, no I don’t think that gender matters. The work should speak for itself.

Rabindra said; 'From a personal perspective though, in terms of support for women, in the context of our own background and coming from an Indian family, actually we’ve had a lot more support being women than we would have done being men. Because traditionally it’s the men who are meant to be the breadwinners and go out and get a so-called ‘decent job’. There was less pressure on the women! So I think from our own cultural context I think it’s been an advantage that we’re women and we’ve had 100% support from our family in pursuing a career as artists.

You can listen to or download the full interview with The Singh Twins here and see photos from the private view on our The Rise of Women Artists Flickr set.