The Wonderful World of the Ladybird Book Artists

This year, the fascinating tale of the skilled artists who brought Ladybird books to life for over three decades was explored at The Wonderful World of the Ladybird Book Artists exhibition at the Victoria Art Gallery in Bath. The exhibition featured rare books, original artworks, and artefacts, demonstrating the role of the illustrators for Ladybird. The exhibition also looked into the collaborative work of these artists, focusing primarily on the company’s “golden years” between 1940 and 1975. 

The origins of Ladybird can be traced back to a printing business called Wills & Hepworth in Loughborough. At the turn of the 20th century, the company offered bookbinding services and sold many products, including artists’ materials, fancy goods, and ladies’ handbags. The outbreak of World War One dealt a heavy blow to their business, forcing them to explore new opportunities. To stay financially afloat, they began to publish affordable children’s books, though these differ vastly from the Ladybird books known today. The books were large and poorly printed on cheap paper, but they helped keep the print works running. 

In 1940, Wills & Hepworth advertised a new type of children’s book – the first classic Ladybird: Bunnkin’s Picnic Party, illustrated (and originally written) by Angusine Macgregor (1881-1961). Due to wartime shortages, a complete mini-book was created using just one sheet of carefully laid-out paper, which remained the blueprint for Ladybird books for the next four decades.

Angusine Macgregor had established herself as an illustrator of children’s picture books for various publishers before she joined Ladybird. Having trained at Birmingham Municipal School of Art, Macgregor had a unique illustration style. Her work at Ladybird included titles like Mrs Bunny’s Refugee, Bobbity Flop and The Adventures of Silver Suit. 

Initially, Ladybird commissioned Macgregor to write and illustrate the stories, but her rhymes did not receive the same level of appreciation as her illustrations. New authors later rewrote some of the books. Despite this, some titles from her Animal Rhyming series of the 1940s remained in print for over 40 years.

In the 1940s, Ladybird books targeted preschool children and comprised fictional tales and rhymes. In the early 1950s, the company shifted its focus towards producing high-quality illustrated non-fictional books for the rapidly growing education market. The first subject chosen for this new venture was Nature. This radical change was driven by Douglas Keen (1913-2008), who believed Ladybird could produce books that catered to a broader audience range and diverse interests. The first book in the Nature series British Birds and their Nests was an immediate success, paving the way for more books on identifying trees, butterflies, birds, shells, rocks, and clouds. Books like Our Land in the Making demonstrated Britain’s rapidly changing post-war landscape, with the rise of suburban life and expansion of the road network. 

Ladybird was committed to ensuring the accuracy and quality of the books, so they carefully selected writers and artists who were renowned experts in their respective fields to produce the Nature books. Allen Seaby (1867-1953) loved Japanese-style colour woodblock printing, which features in British Birds and their Nests and A 2nd Book of British Birds and their Nests. Roland Green (1890-1972) created numerous bird studies in watercolours and oils, as did Charles Frederick Tunnicliffe (1901-79).

Ronald Lampitt (1906-88), a self-taught commercial illustrator from Worcester, began his career by producing work for Medici cards, Reader’s Digest, Look & Learn, the Whitbread calendar, railway posters, and numerous cover illustrations for the weekly magazine John Bull. Later, Lampitt contributed to Ladybird books, including Plants & How They Live, Our Land in the Making Books 1 and 2, Understanding Maps, Learning About Insects & Small Animals, What to Look for Inside a Church, and What to Look for Outside a Church. His artistic style featured wistful, nostalgic landscapes of sprawling views with elm trees, small lanes, and tiny figures going about their daily activities. Lampitt also created cityscapes and crowd scenes.

Ladybird began issuing approximately two history books a year, starting with Alfred the Great in 1956, and continuing until 1981. The History series became the largest of all Ladybird series with 50 different titles. The books mainly focused on men in history, primarily British leaders and explorers, reflecting the school curriculum of that time. Nevertheless, among the first books published were Florence Nightingale and Queen Elizabeth I. Lawrence du Garde Peach (1890-1974), a dramatist and radio personality, wrote all the books until the 1970s, and John Kenney (1911-72), an artist from Leicestershire, produced most of the illustrations. Later, Ladybird introduced another long series of books that focused on historical development rather than individuals. Called the Achievements series, it covered diverse topics such as ships, cars, newspapers, homes, costumes, printing, oil, and nuclear power. These books were popular with schools in the 1960s and 1970s, and students used them for school projects and homework assignments. Robert Ayton (1915-85), an artist who had previously worked for Eagle magazine, illustrated many of the books in this series.

John Kenney underwent training at Leicester College of Art before serving with the Army during World War Two, where he notably participated in the D-Day landings. Before joining Ladybird, he produced illustrations for the Thomas the Tank Engine series by Reverend Awdry between 1957 and 1962. During his time with Ladybird, Kenney contributed to 31 titles, including Tootles the Taxi and the History books. Eventually, Kenney retired due to ill health and was replaced by Roger Hall. 

At 15, Roger Hall (1914-2006) embarked on his career as an artist by painting publicity images for cinema displays. Being self-taught, he devoted his weekends to studying portraits in art galleries like the Tate and National Galleries. Eventually, Hall ventured into book illustrations, working with various publishers such as Pan, Corgi, and Mills & Boon. In 1955, he created the first-ever depiction of James Bond on a book cover – the paperback edition of Casino Royale. Hall joined Ladybird later in his career, taking over the History books from his predecessor, John Kenney. When Ladybird decided to update the History series books in the 1980s, Hall was frequently chosen to create the cover illustrations, even if other artists were responsible for the rest. Ladybird believed his painting style would appeal to children and parents and help sell the books.

Ladybird books gained popularity in schools across Britain during the 1960s, prompting the company to explore topics that interest older children. Consequently, a series of books was proposed to educate children about the world of work. The People at Work series debuted in 1962 with The Fireman and concluded with In a Big Store in 1973, comprising 20 books. John Berry, an artist with a talent for photo-realism and portraiture, was chosen to illustrate all the books. The series featured titles such as The Soldier, The Policeman, The Nurse, The Roadbuilders, and The Customs Officer.

John Berry (1920-2010) volunteered for the RAF at the start of World War Two. He was later selected as a war artist and travelled to the Middle East. Four of his paintings were later acquired by the Imperial War Museum. After the war, Berry produced society portraits and freelance advertising. In the 1950s, he designed an advertisement for Esso’s Tiger in Your Tank campaign, for which he also created the slogan. From the late 1950s to the 1980s, Berry found plenty of work with Ladybird due to his exceptional talent. He illustrated numerous travel books, including The Ladybird Book of London, and all 20 books in the People at Work series. 

Ladybird introduced a separate series of People at Work to emphasize the benefits of Public Services, including Gas, Electricity and Water. While women were more prominently featured in the books in the 1970s, the initial books emphasized the work of men. To offer a more detailed and technical introduction to specific topics, the How it Works series was launched in 1965, mainly illustrated by Bernard Robinson (1912-70). The series served as an introductory handbook to aspects of modern technology, including The Camera, The Rocket, The Hovercraft, and The Computer. Many engineering undergraduates reportedly wrote essays based on these books, and workplaces used them for basic training.

Ladybird occasionally published fairy tales and fantasy stories for preschool children. In 1964, the company decided to undertake an extensive series of beautifully illustrated fairy tales, including classics such as Cinderella, Three Little Pigs, and The Magic Porridge Pot. This series, aptly named Well-Loved Tales, became one of the most popular series Ladybird ever produced. Douglas Keen gave a previously published Ladybird book from 1959, Little Red Riding Hood and Goldilocks, originally illustrated by Harry Wingfield, to two artists, Eric Winter and Robert Lumley, to use as a model for the new book series. Winter and Lumley’s collaboration resulted in a colourful world filled with princesses in lovely dresses, frightening wolves, helpful elves, wise hens, and terrifying trolls. The text, written by Vera Southgate (1916-95), was just long enough to be read as a bedtime story and easy enough for young readers. 

Eric Winter (1905-81) mostly illustrated children’s comics and women’s magazines before joining Ladybird. One of his notable achievements was designing the iconic Abbey National Building Society logo in the 1950s, which the company used until 2003. Winter worked for Ladybird from 1960 and illustrated many titles in the Well-Loved Tales series, including Cinderella, Rapunzel, Puss in Boots, and Goldilocks.

Robert Lumley (1920-76) trained under the art director of Disney’s Bambi. In 1952, Lumley established Broad Oak Studies in Harfield Broad Oak, Essex, with his wife Sally, where he worked on illustration, animation, fine art, and design projects. From 1964 to 1974, Lumley contributed to several titles in Ladybird’s Well-Loved Tales series, including The Elves and the Shoemaker, The Three Little Pigs, The Gingerbread Boy, and The Enormous Turnip. He often used local residents and townscapes as models and settings for his illustrations.

The Key Words Reading Scheme, also known as the Peter and Jane series, was initially introduced in 1964. The reading scheme comprised 36 books, divided into 12 colour-coded levels, and taught children from their first words to confident reading. This scheme became Ladybird’s most significant commercial success. Douglas Keen enlisted the help of Harry Wingfield and Martin Aitchison, two of his most trusted illustrators, to depict the daily lives of Peter and Jane, along with their dog Pat. The project was a massive undertaking with 36 books, each containing 24 illustrations, produced within a tight deadline. On occasion, Robert Ayton, John Berry, and Frank Hampson assisted with the artwork. The reading scheme was a significant financial risk, but it quickly became popular, earning a place on school bookshelves throughout the country and teaching generations of children how to read. 

Harry Wingfield (1910-2002) began his career in advertising in 1930 when he started working for electrical manufacturers Crabtree in Birmingham. It was during this time that he first met Douglas Keen. Wingfield’s first commission for Ladybird was for the book Little Red Riding Hood, and from then on he became one of the most extensively employed Ladybird artists. From 1959 to 1980, he illustrated numerous series including Learning with Mother, collaborating with his wife Ethel, who was a teacher and early years specialist. Along with Martin Aitchison, he was the main illustrator for the Key Words Reading Scheme from the early 1960s.

Frank Hampson (1918-85) played a key role in the success of the groundbreaking Eagle magazine from 1950 to 1959, where he illustrated and initially wrote the Dan Dare strip. From 1964 to 1970, Hampson worked for Ladybird, where his work included Nursery Rhymes 1, 2 and 3; Kings and Queens of England; two books in the Key Words Reading Scheme, and The Stories of Our Christmas Customs.

Ladybird’s success saw a sharp rise from the 1950s to the 1970s, a time when the social landscape of Britain underwent significant changes. Until then, Ladybird artists, primarily white men, had relied on their own lives and the people around them – family and neighbours – as models for their illustrations. Following criticism from the press and schools, Ladybird decided to update the artwork for the Peter and Jane books, making changes to fashion, Jane’s role and increasing the representation of social diversity. In the 1970s, Ladybird introduced a shorter version of the Peter and Jane books, set in the Caribbean, where Ken and Joy became Ladybird’s first black main characters. Artist Martin Aitchison travelled to Trinidad, Jamaica, and the Bahamas to collect reference photographs. Known as the Sunstart scheme, Aitchinson fondly remembered it as some of his most satisfying work for Ladybird.

Martin Aitchison (1919-2016) trained at the Birmingham School of Art and the Slade School of Art, where he met his future wife Dorothy. Dorothy wrote some of the books for Ladybird, which included adaptations of traditional stories. During World War Two, Aitchison illustrated operating manuals for Vickers Aircraft. He also worked with Barnes Wallis and created visuals to help “sell” the idea of the bouncing bomb used in the Dambusters raid. Aitchison’s first book for Ladybird was A First Book of British Saints, but Douglas Keen initially rejected his artwork as “not right for us”. However, Aitchison went on to illustrate almost 100 different titles for Ladybird during his 30-year stint until his retirement in 1985. 

The exhibition at the Victoria Art Gallery stopped in the 1980s but that is not the end of Ladybird’s story. For instance, in November 2014, Ladybird signed up to the Let Books Be Books campaign and announced that it was “committed” to avoiding labelling books as “for girls” or “for boys” and would be removing such gender labelling in reprinted copies. In 2015, Ladybird announced that it would be publishing its first series of books for adults. The books, which parody the style and artwork of the company’s books for children, include the titles The Hangover, Mindfulness, Dating, and The Hipster.

In 2015, Ladybird celebrated its 100th anniversary. Today, Ladybird is part of the Penguin Random House publishing company and includes modern icons such as Topsy and Tim, Peppa Pig and In the Night Garden. The brand has expanded from picture books into a multi-platform experience with various computer apps. 

Whilst The Wonderful World of the Ladybird Book Artists is a nostalgic exhibition, Ladybird Books are not a thing of the past. New books are continually published, and the old ones are still loved by children and adults today. What began as a publishing company trying to stay afloat during the war years resulted in a worldwide success story. Many may regard these books as quintessentially British, but stories are also published in Swedish, Afrikaans, French, German, Dutch, Swedish, Norweigan, Danish, Finnish, Welsh, Scots Gaelic, Irish Gaelic, Arabic, Chinese, Japanese, Malay, Zulu and even Esperanto. 

Unfortunately, The Wonderful World of the Ladybird Book Artists closed on 14th April 2024. They gallery’s new exhibition Toulouse-Lautrec and the Masters of Montmartre is open until 29th September 2024.

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Legion

Until 23rd June 2024, the British Museum is delving into the lives of Roman Soldiers. Rome rose to prominence due to its powerful army. By creating powerful soldiers, the empire defeated its enemies, while at the same time, the population rapidly grew by promising citizenship to all foreigners who fought on their behalf. The exhibition guides visitors from joining the army to eventual discharge or death. With the help of Horrible Histories character Claudius Terrattus, Legion suits young and old visitors.

A Roman legion typically consisted of over 5000 men at a time. Only 120 were cavalry, while the rest travelled and fought on foot. Each legion split into ten cohorts of around 480 soldiers. Within these cohorts, the soldiers divided into centuries containing 80 men, subdivided into a contubernium or tent of 8 soldiers.

As in any army, men had different ranks, but these usually depended on citizenship status rather than skill. One regiment called Auxiliaries was for non-citizen troops. Upon retiring, auxiliaries were granted valuable Roman citizenship instead of money. The advantages of a military career passed down the family line. Once a father acquired citizenship, his sons could try to join the elite legions rather than the auxiliaries. Only Roman citizens could join the elite legions, although they often needed someone to vouch for their status.

Potential recruits were drawn to the Roman army by the promise of regular pay and improved social status. People from all over the empire joined the legions. These soldiers often served alongside men from different cultures and were posted to locations they had never been to before. The training was rigorous, from marching long distances to practising with weapons.

Aside from citizenship status, the army had strict requirements for those who wished to join. The minimum height required was 172 cm (5 feet and 7 inches), which meant that even some boys as young as thirteen were eligible to apply. On the other hand, shorter men could not join the ranks, although bribery often worked. The age limit for enlistment was 35, and recruits were required to submit letters of recommendation. Those who failed to join the legions sometimes managed to gain entry to the less-prestigious marines with the help of friends already in the service. Once the recruits took an oath, it was impossible to back out. The only way to leave the army was through medical discharge, retirement, dishonour, or death.

After taking the oath, if a soldier felt dissatisfied with their role, their only option was to seek a different position within the ranks. Transferring to better-paid regiments such as cavalry or citizen-exclusive legions required the right social connections. It often involved saving up money and finding letters of recommendation. Promotion was another possibility, usually with a fifty-percent pay rise or double the basic pay. For promotion, soldiers needed to be able to read and write. In a time when illiteracy was prevalent, soldiers who could write understood that this was their most profitable skill. Non-citizen soldiers could also rise through the ranks, but their pay was never as high as their citizen counterparts.

Only the most capable and well-connected soldiers could work their way up to the rank of centurion, which came with increased pay and the responsibility of commanding a unit of eighty or more men. Occasionally, someone who showed exceptional skill or bravery earned a promotion through a “vote of the legion”. Additionally, having a centurion as a father could help fast-track a soldier’s promotion.

Infantry or foot soldiers made up most of the army, and opportunities to become a Cavalryman were slim. Cavalrymen enjoyed extra pay for owning a horse and its equipment, which was often taken care of by a slave. They had fewer duties but faced more dangerous assignments, such as scouting, policing hostile territories, or scaling besieged city walls. The cavalry also put on military displays to show off their training. They carried out mock battles while adorned in special face-mask helmets not meant for battle. These were highly decorated, often depicting mythological warriors.

Soldiers were responsible for purchasing weapons and armour. There was no standard uniform for soldiers except for a military belt. The dress options were limited, and the equipment used by soldiers depended on their role and reflected social class distinctions. Citizen legionaries carried long, curving shields and armour-piercing javelins, while the auxiliaries only had simple spears and flat oval shields.

One type of body armour called a cuirass protected a soldier’s torso. Some were segmental cuirass made of 40 plates fixed with straps and hinges. It provided the soldier with the protective strength of an iron breastplate and the flexibility of movement and shoulder protection. Although sculptures and artworks often depict legionaries wearing this armour, archaeologists excavated many examples of cuirass at auxiliary bases.

Whilst soldiers mostly marched on campaigns, they knew they would eventually face the daunting prospect of battle. Although highly organised, some enemies put the Roman army’s training and tactics to the test. Typically, Rome’s soldiers created a solid shield wall or deployed javelin-hurling legionaries in eight battle lines, backed by archers and artillery. After the battle, enemy captives suffered horrific treatment at the hands of the victors. Conquered land and the spoils of war (both human and material) became the property of the empire or the elite soldiers.

Out of all the Roman legionary long shields known as scutum, only one complete shield has survived. Discovered in Rome’s Syrian frontier, the dry climate has helped preserve the wood and the painted leather surface. Although the semi-cylindrical shape of the shield is now more curled, it still bears Roman victory and regimental motifs, including an eagle with a laurel wreath, winged Victories and a lion on a military red background. The colour and design either represented the soldier or his unit.

The Roman army constructed forts along the empire’s frontiers and unstable regions to quell local unrest. Beyond the walls of the forts, civilian towns or vici with amenities like bathhouses, shops, and taverns emerged. These towns served as a haven for soldiers after spending months on campaigns and allowed them to enjoy their lives outside of military obligations. While soldiers below the rank of centurion were not allowed to marry, they could form unofficial relationships with local women or enslaved concubines.

Soldiers with unofficial relationships or concubines could marry after being discharged or promoted. A surviving tombstone of Regina, the wife of a soldier called Barates, is potential evidence of this. Regina came from southern England and Barates from Syria, but they spent their adult lives by Hadrian’s Wall. Regina is described as a freedwoman, suggesting she may initially have been Barates’ enslaved concubine.

The Roman Empire expanded by conquering territories and bringing the local populations under Roman law. Approximately 300,000 troops acted as army, navy, and police force for a population of over 60 million people. Roman soldiers were often unpopular and faced hazardous conditions, such as riots and rebellions. The Roman military inflicted harsh punishments, including beatings and executions, which ranged from quick beheadings to slow, public spectacles meant to intimidate and entertain, such as crucifixion. Upon entering service, soldiers relinquished their civilian rights, and those who acted dishonourably could face the same punishments as civilians.

After serving for twenty-five years, approximately fifty per cent of soldiers were lucky enough to survive the illnesses and violence that came with the job. Citizen soldiers awaited honourable discharge, along with a bonus upon retirement. For auxiliaries, the end of service meant a fundamental change of status – Roman citizenship – which came with various rights and privileges related to law, taxes, and property. Only after completion of service could soldiers and their families count as citizens of Rome.

The earliest known example of a retirement ‘diploma’ dates to AD 79. It grants the citizenship of Sparticus Dipscurtus, a Thracian soldier who served as a marine in the Bay of Naples, Italy. The citizenship included his wife and children.

Later, Emperor Septimius Severus (ruled AD 193-211) improved the pay and rights of soldiers. Emperor Caracalla (ruled AD 198-217) took this further by extending universal citizenship to all unenslaved inhabitants of the Roman world. This change also altered the Roman army, where legionaries and auxiliaries now had the same social status.

The British Museum displays many examples of Roman weapons, armour, and items excavated from former forts. A few human skeletons are also exhibited, including a crucified man, who may have deserted the army while stationed in Cambridgeshire.

To make the exhibition child-friendly, the British Museum includes several hands-on elements, including a couple of games, dressing up, things to smell and the chance to discover if you would have retired from the Roman Army. The detailed descriptions of artefacts and historical information are simplified by Claudius Terrattus, who describes his imaginary experiences as an auxiliary.

At £22 per adult, the Legion exhibition is rather pricey, however, children under 16 are free when accompanied by a paying adult. Booking is required for all tickets except for Members of the British Museum.

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Philip Guston

Until 25th February 2024, 50 years of work by Canadian artist Philip Guston (1913-80) is on display at Tate Modern. Concerned with philosophical and social concerns, Guston’s abstract expressionist work responds to wars, racism and violence. He felt it was his responsibility to challenge “the brutality of the world” through his art and consistently changed and reinvented himself in doing so.

Born Phillip Goldstein in Montreal on 27th June 1913, Guston was the son of Russian Jewish parents, who immigrated to Canada shortly before his birth. At age 6, Guston and his family moved to Los Angeles, where they became aware of the Ku Klux Klan’s racism towards Jews and Blacks. As a result of this persecution, Guston’s father hanged himself in 1923. His older brother died in a car crash a few years later.

In 1927, Guston enrolled in the Los Angeles Manual Arts High School and became friends with future artist Jackson Pollock (1912-56). Although the boys detested the school’s emphasis on sports over art, their education included European modern art, Eastern philosophy, theosophy and mystic literature, which greatly influenced their artistic careers. After high school, Guston attended the Otis Art Institute in Los Angeles but left after a year, dissatisfied with the teaching methods. From then on, Guston remained a self-taught artist, taking inspiration from the people he met throughout his life.

Guston’s early works focused on racism, including a mural for the John Reed Club of Los Angeles to raise money for the Scottsboro Boys Trial in 1932, in which nine Black teenagers were falsely accused of rape and sentenced to death. The mural, which Guston worked on with American artist Reuben Kadish (1913-92), aimed to help the boys gain freedom, but the police and anti-communist groups destroyed the artwork.

Guston and Kadish worked on another mural in 1934 in the former summer palace of Emperor Maximilian. Titled The Struggle Against Terror, the mural spanned 1,000-square-foot (93 m2) and caught the attention of Time magazine, who called them “the most promising painters in either the US or Mexico”. The artwork detailed stories from Mexican history, which the artists learnt from the muralist Diego Rivera (1886-1957), the husband of Frida Kahlo (1907-54). Scenes included: tortured women; hooded priests of the Spanish Inquisition, which look similar to costumes worn by the Ku Klux Klan; men felling a giant; and Communist symbols. Overall, it demonstrated the Mexican people’s resistance to persecution and violence.

Between 1934 and 1943, Guston worked on over 15 murals and public artworks. These included several for the Works Progress Administration in New York, where he moved in 1935. Guston took inspiration from Mexican muralists, American realist painters, and Renaissance artists, such as Giotto (1267-1337).

In 1935, due to Hitler’s rise in Germany, many American Jews changed their names to hide their Jewish heritage. Phillip Goldstein became Philip Guston, by which name he was known for the rest of his life. In 1937, Guston married Musa McKim (1908-92), a painter and poet. Musa also worked on murals, such as Pulp Wood Logging and Wildlife in White Mountain for the U.S. Forest Service building in Laconia, New Hampshire alongside her husband.

During the 1950s, Guston began experimenting with abstract expressionism, known as the New York School. Comprising of American poets, painters, dancers, and musicians, the School took inspiration from surrealism and other contemporary art forms. Many of Guston’s paintings from this era consisted of blocks of colour and gestural strokes. Zone (1953-54), for instance, is a mass of predominantly red brush markings, although some blue is also visible.

“Blue is a strange colour to use for me in any case – because it always evaporates … But to bring it frontal, to make it feel on the plane, to me, is something to conjure with.” – Philip Guston

Guston used a limited colour palette during the 1950s, predominately favouring black, grey, red and blue. Although his abstract expressionist paintings may appear like a blur of colours, Guston maintained that they all represented something. The Return (1956-58) contains abstracted forms or figures returning home from a long absence.

Towards the end of Guston’s abstract expressionist period, he became interested in ambiguous, solid forms. By the late 1960s, Guston’s art resembled cartoons, which some critics found distasteful. One curator, Michael Auping, exclaimed, “He’s out of his mind, and this isn’t art,” yet many people changed their minds and grew to appreciate Guston’s new style.

Guston’s first exhibition featuring his neo-expressionist works focused on the injustices he saw in society. His large-scale paintings depicted hooded figures in commonplace settings, such as in the car, school, or the workplace. The hoods were not solely representative of the Ku Klux Klan; they symbolised evil. “The idea of evil fascinated me … I almost tried to imagine that I was living with the Klan. What would it be like to be evil? To plan and plot.”

American historian Carter G. Woodson (1875-1950) once wrote, “There would be no lynching if it did not start in the schoolroom.” Guston attempted to demonstrate this in his paintings of hooded figures. The hoods obscured the identities of the people under them, so it was impossible to know who belonged to the Klan. Teachers at schools and other authoritative figures could influence unsuspecting children to develop racist and unjust opinions.

During the 1970s, Guston moved away from painted hooded figures to depicting everyday objects or junk, which he referred to as “crapola”. Guston worked closely with young poets and writers, such as Clark Coolidge (b,1939) and Philip Roth (1933-2018). He produced images or “poem-pictures” based on their verses. Guston also featured his wife’s poetry in his paintings.

Guston began symbolically featuring his wife in his paintings, usually representing her by her forehead and parted hair. In The Ladder (1978), Musa’s head peaks over a blue wall, upon which leans a ladder and an impossible pair of legs. Alternatively, the scene could depict a free-standing ladder in a vast ocean, with the sun appearing just over the horizon.

Musa McKim suffered a series of strokes in 1977, which prevented her from writing poetry. Caring for his wife made Guston aware of his own mortality, which is evident in the dark, nightmarish scenes of his final paintings. Guston painted Couple in Bed (1977) shortly after his wife’s health deteriorated. It depicts Guston clinging to Musa in bed, while in his hand he grips his paintbrushes. For 40 years, Guston relied on Musa’s presence in his life as much as he did his art materials. This painting represents Guston’s fear that the two constants in his life would be taken from him.

The Line (1978) is one of Guston’s most recognised paintings, thanks to Tate Modern using it for their exhibition advertisements. A hand gripping a piece of charcoal descends from the sky and draws a line along the ground. There are several theories about the meaning of the piece. Guston once said about art, “I think it’s kind of like devil’s work … Only God can make a tree.” The hand reaching down from the sky is like God reaching down from the heavens. Alternatively, it may reflect Guston’s method of working with other artists, poets and writers. He often felt other people were guiding his hand, almost as though he had no control over the outcome.

“When you start working, everybody is in your studio – the past, your friends, enemies, the art world, and above all, your own ideas … But as you continue painting, they start leaving, one by one, and you are left completely alone. Then, if you’re lucky, even you leave.” – Philip Guston

A couple of weeks before Guston’s retrospective exhibition at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, Guston died of a heart attack on 7th June 1980. The death of the 66-year-old artist prompted renewed interest in his work, which continues to the present day. Whilst Guston’s visual style changed throughout his career, his paintings were usually preoccupied with life’s nightmares, such as social injustice. Nevertheless, it is not always possible to decipher the meanings of his canvases. Guston believed a painting should tell a story and allow the viewer to see what they want to see.

Guston’s themes have caused controversy recently, with many galleries banning his work, including the Tate Modern. The paintings of Klan figures caused the most problems, with Tate, the Museum of Fine Arts in Houston, and the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston jointly postponing their 2020 retrospectives to 2024 “until a time at which we think that the powerful message of social and racial justice that is at the centre of Philip Guston’s work can be more clearly interpreted.” Over 2,000 artists signed a petition in protest of this decision, prompting the galleries to bring their exhibitions forward to 2022 and 2023.

Philip Guston’s artwork may not be to everyone’s tastes, but it gives a first-person account of the various atrocities faced in the 20th century. Whilst Guston did not suffer at the hands of the Nazis, he experienced the anti-Jewish behaviour of groups such as the Ku Klux Klan. He also witnessed the effects of racism in America, yet was not afraid to draw attention to the evil through his art.

The Philip Guston exhibition at the Tate Modern is open until 25th February 2024. Tickets cost £20. Concessions are available.

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Piet Mondrian

Piet Mondrian (1872-1944), one of the pioneers of abstract art, is known for his use of primary colours and simple geometric shapes. Whilst his work is highly recognisable, his philosophy that art should reflect the spiritual world is less known. Until 3rd September 2023, Tate Modern is exploring Mondrian’s life, work and philosophies alongside Hilma af Klint (1862-1944), a lesser-known female abstract artist.

Pieter Cornelis Mondriaan was born in Amersfoort, the Netherlands on 7th March 1872 to strict Protestant parents. His father, of the same name, worked as a head teacher but was also a qualified drawing teacher. Having been introduced to art at a young age, Mondrian entered the Academy for Fine Art in Amsterdam after qualifying as a primary school teacher. For some time, he managed to combine his career in education with his love of art, producing naturalistic and Impressionistic paintings in his spare time.

Most of Mondrian’s early works are landscapes featuring pastoral scenes. Influenced by his home country, Mondrian frequently painted windmills, rivers, fields and trees. Whilst these were representational works, Mondrian experimented with the many art movements of the late 19th century, including Impressionism, pointillism and Fauvism. By 1893, he had enough work to display at his first exhibition.

Mondrian’s early works begin to show a degree of abstraction as he started to experiment with different colour palettes, for instance, red, yellow and blue. The trees and other features gradually became less distinct, such as Gray Tree (1911), which Mondrian produced while staying in Paris. While living in France between 1911 and 1914, Mondrian changed his surname from Mondriaan to Mondrian and took inspiration from the Cubist artists Pablo Picasso (1881-1973) and Georges Braque (1882-1963). Although Gray Tree contains a measure of representation, the branches are more angular and geometric than in his previous work.

In 1908, Mondrian developed an interest in Helena Petrovna Blavatsky’s (1831-91) Theosophical Society, which believed it was possible to gain a spiritual knowledge of nature. Through his work, Mondrian determined to seek this knowledge. Mondrian and other artists, such as Hilma af Klint, sought to present spiritual concepts visually using abstract techniques and colours. Joining the Dutch branch of the Theosophical Society in 1909 had a greater impact on Mondrian’s aesthetic than the myriad of competing art movements.

While Mondrian was visiting his home country in 1914, the First World War began, forcing him to remain in the Netherlands for the next four years. During this time, he resided in the artists’ colony in Laren, where he met Bart van der Leck (1876-1958) and Theo van Doesburg (1883-1931). Although Mondrian had experimented with primary colours in the past, Van der Leck’s exclusive use of the colours red, blue and yellow had a profound impact on Mondrian’s artwork. Van Doesburg, whilst using a wider range of colours, encouraged Mondrian to continue developing his Cubist style.

Gradually, Mondrian’s work became less pictorial and moved away from Cubism. Together with Van Doesburg, Mondrian founded De Stijl (“The Style”), also known as Neoplasticism, in 1917, which advocated pure abstraction. Whilst Cubism is an abstract movement, De Stijl reduced visual compositions further to vertical and horizontal lines and shapes, using only black, white and primary colours.

Between 1917 and 1918, Mondrian published an essay called Neo-Plasticism in Pictorial Art in instalments in the new movement’s magazine, also called De Stijl. Mondrian believed traditional representation art only focused on the external world, whereas geometric abstraction created a sense of balance and harmony to emphasise the internal qualities of the universe. Mondrian also maintained that the fundamental principles of the universe could be demonstrated in grid-like compositions.

After the First World War, Mondrian returned to Paris, where he remained for two decades. Here, he fully embraced “pure abstract art” and produced some of his most iconic artworks. Mondrian began by painting grid-like compositions consisting of thin black lines forming rectangles, which he filled with blue, red, yellow, grey or white paint. Over time, the black lines increased in thickness, and the number of geometric shapes reduced.

Although digital and photographic versions of Mondrian’s paintings appear flat, that is not the reality. The black lines are the flattest parts of the compositions, whereas the coloured sections are built up from many layers of paint. Close examination reveals Mondrian only moved the paintbrush in one direction when applying red, blue or yellow, but the white sections have brush strokes running in several different directions.

“Holland has produced three great painters who, though a logical expression of their own country, rose above it through the vigour of their personality – the first was Rembrandt, the second was Van Gogh, and the third is Mondrian.” So said Katherine Dreier (1877-1952), a founder of New York City’s Society of Independent Artists, after visiting Mondrian’s studio in Paris. Dreier purchased one of Mondrian’s paintings and exhibited it in the United States at the end of the 1920s.

During the 1930s, Mondrian significantly reduced the amount of colour in his compositions. He began to focus on the impact of lines, frequently doubling them up to create a new dynamism. These paintings are visually busier than his earlier grid-style canvases.

Due to the rise of Fascism, Mondrian left France for London in 1938, where he resided for two years. After Paris fell to the Nazis in 1940, Mondrian left Europe altogether, settling in Manhattan, New York. Mondrian continued to produce grid-like compositions, which, despite their simplicity, took hours to execute.

Moving to America brought about a significant change in Mondrian’s work. Rather than using black lines and blocks of colour, Mondrian began using red, yellow and blue lines instead. New York City (1942) is one example of Mondrian’s new style. The lines towards the top of the painting are denser than at the bottom, which some critics suggest represents the sky.

Using strips of tape, Mondrian experimented with the position of the lines before painting directly on the canvas. The technique is evident in the unfinished painting New York City I, which has some similarities to the completed New York City. The unfinished work hangs in the Kunstsammlung Nordrhein-Westfalen in Düsseldorf, Germany. Last year, an unearthed photograph of the painting in Mondrian’s studio proved the artwork had been hung upside down in the gallery.

The grid-like cityscape in Manhattan inspired many of Mondrian’s artworks during the years he spent in America. He also took inspiration from the people in the city, particularly the jazz scene. Broadway Boogie Woogie (1943) incorporates rigid architecture and jazz tones by dividing the composition into more squares than previous works. Mondrian replaced solid lines with small adjoining rectangles of colour. Some critics suggest Mondrian captured the neon lights that dotted the city during the night.

“Mondrian’s life and his affection for music are mirrored in the painting [and that it is] a testimony of the influence which New York had on Mondrian.” So said Jürgen Stoye about the unfinished artwork Victory Boogie Woogie. Whilst some lines and shapes are complete, pieces of coloured paper indicate where Mondrian intended to paint. Stoye believed the music scene of New York began to influence Mondrian more than the grid-like architecture. Mondrian’s decision to rotate the canvas by 45 degrees may support this theory.

Despite Mondrian’s reputation for abstract art, he had a secret passion for painting flowers. He began producing floral images early in his career before branching out into Cubism and De Stijl, yet, Roses in a Vase (1938-1940) proves Mondrian continued to work on these subjects in private. Mondrian claimed to his close friends that he only painted flowers for commercial reasons, but the truth of this claim remains uncertain.

Piet Mondrian passed away on 1st February 1944 from pneumonia at the age of 71. Nearly 200 people attended his memorial service in Manhattan, including the artists Marc Chagall (1887-1985) and Marcel Duchamp (1887-1968). Mondrian left his estate, including the copyright to all his works, to his friend Henry Holtzman (1912-87), who had arranged Mondrian’s passage from London to New York in 1940. When Holtzman passed away in 1987, his children established the Mondrian/Holtzman trust to look after the paintings until the copyrights expired in 2015.

As an artist, Mondrian has inspired and continues to inspire many people. Art critic Robert Hughes (1938-2012) described Mondrian as “one of the supreme artists of the 20th century” who “believed that the conditions of human life could be changed by making pictures”. With such a distinctive and recognisable style, Mondrian’s work was quickly appropriated by other artists, particularly fashion designers. Before his death, Hermès designed a range of bags based on Mondrian’s latest paintings. Three decades later, Yves Saint Laurent released the 1965 Mondrian collection, featuring Mondrian’s iconic black lines and blocks of primary colours.

In 2008, the athletic footwear company Nike released a pair of trainers based on Mondrian’s De Stijl paintings. Since the copyright on Mondrian’s work expired in 2015, the amount of Mondrian-inspired fashion has risen considerably. A quick search on Google finds dresses and shirts on sale at Shein, Etsy, and ASOS. Dutch companies, such as the Miffy Shop, based on illustrations by Dick Bruna (1927-2017), have also embraced Mondrian’s style.

Modern art is subjective and open to interpretation. Some people may not appreciate Mondrian’s unique style or understand his work, but it does not diminish the fact that it has had a huge impact on the art world. Designers have put Mondrian’s pleasing patterns to good use, incorporating them into fashion and graphic design. Yet, beneath the layers of paint is an artist attempting to create a sense of balance and harmony in a world full of war, hate and fear.

To view some of Piet Mondrian’s paintings and notebooks in conjunction with Hilma af Klint, visit the Forms of Life exhibition at Tate Britain. Tickets are available until 3rd September 2023 and cost £20. Some concessions are available.

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The Pioneer of Abstract Art

Tate Modern is currently exploring the works of two groundbreaking artists, Piet Mondrian (1872-1944) and Hilma af Klint (1862-1944). The exhibition, subtitled Forms of Life, which runs until 3rd September 2023, displays the works of two artists who never met yet inspired each other. Mondrian is the better-known of the two artists. Even those who do not know his name will recognise his iconic abstract paintings of blue, yellow and red rectangles. The works of the lesser-known Swedish painter af Klint will be a brand-new experience for many since the art world is only recently uncovering the forgotten female artists of the past.

Hilma af Klint and Piet Mondrian were two of the first abstract artists of the Western world. Af Klint’s paintings differed slightly from other artists of this genre because she used complex spiritual ideas as inspiration for her work. Af Klint was both an artist and a mystic who followed Theosophy and aimed to make contact with the “Masters of the Ancient Wisdom”, also known as mahatmas and the Elder Brothers of the Human Race.

Born on 26th October 1862, af Klint was the fourth child of Captain Victor af Klint, a naval officer, and Mathilda née Sonntag. The summers the family spent at their manor Hanmora on the island of Adelsö inspired af Klint’s love of art and spirituality. Initially, her father tried to instil a passion for mathematics and botany, but after the family moved to Stockholm, af Klint enrolled at the University of Arts, Crafts and Design to study portraiture and landscape painting.

At age 20, af Klint joined the Royal Academy of Fine Arts and continued to study portraiture and landscape painting until 1887 when she graduated with honours. After setting up her studio in Stockholm, af Klint’s reputation grew, and she produced numerous landscapes, botanical drawings and portraits throughout her career. Yet, Tate Modern focuses more on the work Klint created behind closed doors, which differs greatly from her commercial artwork.

Af Klint’s fascination with the spiritual dimension began in 1880 following the death of her younger sister Hermina. She became interested in the Theosophy of Madame Blavatsky and the philosophy of Christian Rosencreutz. The latter was a potentially fictional Christian pilgrim who travelled to the Holy Land, where he developed ideas that bordered on the occult. Rudolf Steiner, the founder of the Anthroposophical Society who had a particular interest in Rosencreutz, visited Stockholm in 1908 and introduced af Klint to some of his theories. These, in turn, inspired af Klint’s art.

Modernist artists at the turn of the century searched for new art forms through which they could depict spiritual beliefs, politics and new scientific systems. Many of these artists, including Piet Mondrian, took inspiration from the Theosophical Movement. Members described themselves as “an unsectarian body of seekers after Truth, who endeavour to promote Brotherhood and strive to serve humanity.” Af Klint used theosophical beliefs as inspiration for abstract art, but she felt the world was not ready for such a groundbreaking genre and kept her work secret.

While studying at the Royal Academy of Fine Arts, af Klint met the Swedish artist Anna Cassel (1860-1937), who introduced her to three spiritualist women, Cornelia Cederberg (1854-1933), Sigrid Hedman (1855-1922) and Mathilda Nilsson (1844-1923). As a group, they joined the Edelweiss Society, which embraced the teachings of Blavatsky. In 1896, the five women formed an independent group, Dem Fem (The Five), which focused on the paranormal.

At the beginning of each meeting, Dem Fem began with a prayer, meditation, a Christian sermon and a reading from the New Testament. They followed this with a séance, the results of which they recorded in a book. It appeared they were contacting or trying to contact higher spirits or High Masters. These sessions inspired af Klint’s artwork, leading her to experiment with geometric forms to capture the unknown spiritual forces in the world.

“The pictures were painted directly through me, without any preliminary drawings, and with great force. I had no idea what the paintings were supposed to depict; nevertheless, I worked swiftly and surely, without changing a single brush stroke.” – Hilma af Klint

Af Klint began her first series of abstract paintings in 1906. The series totalled 193 artworks in all, which af Klint divided into sub-groups. Ten large canvases, aptly named The Ten Largest, demonstrate the different phases of life from birth to death. When Rudolf Steiner saw the series in 1908, he was unimpressed, stating that painting was inappropriate for a theosophist and that Blavatsky had claimed using any form of a medium was faulty practice, leading to black magic and the occult. Steiner seemed to disregard the outlines for visual artists written by Annie Besant and C.W. Leadbeater, who took over from Blavatsky following her death in 1891:

The forms of thoughts are determined by three principles: 1. Quality of thought determines colour. 2. Nature of thought determines form. 3. Definiteness of thought determines clearness of outline.

Naturally, af Klint felt devastated after Steiner rejected her art, but it did not stop her painting. She continued to depict symbolic elements in her work, often representing symmetrical dualities. One series, The Swan, illustrates love and nature. Although they do not resemble a swan, the colours represent various aspects; for instance, the female spirit is blue, and the male is yellow. Pinks and reds stand for physical and spiritual love.

Spirals and circles frequently appeared in af Klint’s work. They usually represent growth, progress or evolution, while other shapes signify ideas or elements of nature. Af Klint dreamt of building a temple in the shape of a spiral where her paintings could be hung in a long, continuous line, demonstrating the human spirit moving towards a higher state.

Although af Klint focused mainly on theosophical, spiritual beliefs, she also incorporated Christian elements into some of her work. Between 1913 and 1915, af Klint produced a series called Tree of Knowledge, which references the Christian narrative of the beginning of the world. The watercolour paintings look like detailed diagrams that break down a three-dimensional planet into two-dimensional planes.

The Tree of Knowledge appears in many cultures and religions, although in different contexts. In some traditions, the tree connects every part of the universe. In Norse mythology, for example, Yggdrasil is a tree at the centre of the cosmos, connecting the heavens with Earth.

Af Klint used a variety of shapes, including botanical-like images, which implies she took influence from the Art Nouveau movement that was prevalent at the time. Her later works lost these details and became simplified geometric compositions.

Although spiritual life drove much of af Klint’s abstract art, she also remained connected to physical life. In the early 1800s, the English physicist John Dalton (1766-1844) introduced the concept of atomic theory, which maintained that all matter is composed of particles called atoms. Over the following century, scientists gained a deeper understanding of atoms, which intrigued af Klint and influenced her paintings.

In 1920, af Klint combined Theosophy with atomic theory to produce a series of black-and-white circles. From a scientific perspective, the paintings resemble diagrams of atoms, but af Klint was also exploring the nature of different world religions. The exact meanings of af Klint’s black and white shades are unknown but may relate to the Chinese philosophy of Yin and Yang, in which Yin is negative, dark, and feminine, and Yang is positive, bright, and masculine. In theory, the interaction of Yin and Yang maintains the harmony of the universe and influences everything within it. Each of the religions portrayed by af Klint has a different combination of black and white, suggesting all religions are made up of the same basic concepts but are utilised differently.

During her career, af Klint filled over 150 notebooks of thoughts and studies. Whilst some of her notes and sketches inspired artwork, her books show how af Klint processed the information she learnt about the world. Since childhood, af Klint held an interest in botany and particularly enjoyed studying Carl Linnaeus’ Systema Naturae, which formalised the naming of living organisms. Af Klint also took inspiration from the illustrations of plants produced by European colonisers. Some of her earlier works incorporated the organic curves and sinuous lines of these drawings, which also inspired Art Nouveau.

In one notebook, af Klint produced an index of flowers, mosses and lichens. Rather than draw accurate diagrams, af Klint used a mix of text and illustration to connect the natural world to her spiritual system. She used symbols, circles and colours to demonstrate the connection between organic entities with character traits and emotions. The plants she included were indigenous to Sweden, including dog rose and water iris.

Despite Rudolf Steiner’s earlier rejection of af Klint’s work, Steiner kept some photographs of af Klint’s work, which he allegedly showed Wassily Kandinsky (1866-1944), inspiring the Russian artist to embrace abstract art. Later in af Klint’s career, Steiner gave her advice about her artwork, encouraging af Klint to develop a “wet on wet” technique. This method allowed watercolour paint to bleed together, thus representing Steiner’s belief that plants participate in a spirit that permeates all of nature.

Although af Klint never officially exhibited her abstract paintings, new evidence suggests she attempted to display them at The Anthroposophical Society. Whilst this was unsuccessful, her work was featured at the 1928 World Conference on Spiritual Science in London. Other than this, only close friends viewed her artwork until the 1960s.

On 21st October 1944, five days before her 82nd birthday, Hilma af Klint died in a traffic accident in Djursholm, Sweden. She bequeathed her collection of over 1,200 paintings and 150 notebooks to her nephew, Vice Admiral Erik af Klint (1901-81), with the instructions that they should be kept secret for at least 20 years after her death. Af Klint’s latest known artwork was allegedly painted in 1932. Ominously, it portrays a map of Europe blowing flames toward England. It has since been titled The Blitz and has been used to cement claims that af Klint was clairvoyant and able to converse with the spirit world to predict events of the Second World War. Or, perhaps, the painting was misdated.

As per her dying wishes, af Klint’s art remained locked away until the 1960s. Her nephew offered the paintings as a gift to the Moderna Museet in Stockholm, but they declined. Unable to get rid of the artwork, most likely because no one knew of Hilma af Klint, Erik af Klint established the Hilma af Klint Foundation. With the help of art historian Åke Fant (1943-97), af Klint’s work was presented at a Nordik conference in Helsinki in 1984. Gradually, the art world learnt her name, and Hilma af Klint became one of Sweden’s most esteemed artists. Finally, in 2018, the Moderna Museet agreed to display af Klint’s paintings in a specially-built gallery, where they remain today.

To view some of Hilma af Klint’s paintings and notebooks in conjunction with Piet Mondrian before they return to Sweden, visit the Forms of Life exhibition at Tate Modern. Tickets are available until 3rd September 2023 and cost £20. Some concessions are available.

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Wallace Woofs

Until October 2023, the Wallace Collection in London is putting on a treat for art lovers and dog lovers alike. Their current exhibition, Portraits of Dogs: From Gainsborough to Hockney, explores humanity’s devotion to dogs across the centuries. Over 50 paintings demonstrate the unique bond between humans and dogs, the majority by British artists. Britain, more so than other countries, developed a love of dog paintings during the 17th century and continues to appreciate the genre today.

Although the majority of artworks in the exhibition date from the 18th century onwards, the oldest exhibit is The Townley Greyhounds, dating back to the 1st or 2nd century CE. On loan from the British Museum, the marble statue depicts two affectionate greyhound-like dogs. Recent examination of the sculpture suggests they are salukis rather than greyhounds. One dog nibbles the ear of the other and places one paw on its back as though caressing a loved one.

The statue is named after Charles Townley (1737-1810), an antiquarian who acquired it from Gavin Hamilton (1723-98) in 1774. Hamilton discovered two sculptures of dogs at Monte Cagnolo outside Rome. The Pope claimed one of the finds, and Townley purchased the other for £50 (almost £10,000 today). The Townley Greyhounds demonstrates that people adored dogs in the ancient world. For the sculptor to produce such a detailed depiction, he needed to study the animals closely and at length.

Another person that studied dogs closely was Leonardo da Vinci (1452-1519). The Renaissance polymath frequently observed the natural world to help improve his understanding of universal laws. Using his artistic abilities, Da Vinci regularly made sketches of his observations, including the anatomy of a dog’s paw, which he drew between 1490 and 1495. The paw probably belonged to a deerhound and was sketched from several angles.

Da Vinci usually annotated his illustrations, but his sketches of a dog’s paw lacks written notes. Whilst the drawings are rough, Da Vinci’s skill is evident through his choice of media. The artist used metalpoint, which is a technique that required considerable control because it was difficult or even impossible to correct or erase lines drawn with the metal stylus on specially prepared paper. Da Vinci did not have access to modern drawing materials, such as pencils, which did not appear until the 18th century.

Apart from strays, dogs were once associated with European elites and had important roles within the household or even at court – usually as a companion. Despite their importance, they did not often appear in artworks until the 16th century. Aristocrats commissioned paintings to demonstrate their wealth and virtue, which dogs began to symbolise.

In Britain, aristocrats developed strong bonds with their pets, and they became part of the family rather than a means of demonstrating wealth. In the 18th century, dog portraiture became popular, almost equaling family and individual portraits amongst the elite. Paintings of dogs became prized possessions, and animal artists, such as George Stubbs (1724-1806), were much sought after.

Stubbs, like Da Vinci, paid close attention to the anatomy of a dog but also accentuated the animal’s and breed’s characteristics. Stubbs managed to give a sense of the dog’s strength and intelligence despite only painting a side-view portrait of the animal. Stubbs’s painting of a lemon and white water spaniel belonging to Charles Anderson-Pelham, 1st Baron Yarborough (1749-1823), seems focused and ready to run, perhaps suggesting it was a very lively creature that could not stay still for long.

Following in Stubbs’ footsteps, Edwin Landseer (1802-73) became the most sought animal painter of the 19th century. He also produced sculptures, such as the lions at the foot of Nelson’s Column in Trafalgar Square, London. Although Landseer created dog portraits for prestigious clients, he found success by depicting dogs in narrative scenes, frequently satirising human life.

One of Landseer’s most successful works was Laying Down the Law, also known as Trial by Jury (1840), which satirises the legal profession. A French poodle sits centre stage, representing the judge, its white, fluffy hair not too dissimilar from a court wig. Other dogs of various breeds represent other members of the court, such as the court clerk and the jury.

Landseer exhibited Trial by Jury at the Royal Academy, where it caught the attention of William Cavendish, 6th Duke of Devonshire (1790-1858). Cavendish chose to purchase the painting on the condition that Landseer added his spaniel into the scene. The brown and white spaniel, Bony, sits on the right-hand side of the judge. The poodle has been said to represent either Lord Brougham or Lord Lyndhurst, both of whom served as Lord Chancellor between the 1820s and 40s.

Another allegorical painting by Landseer is Doubtful Crumbs, which alludes to a passage from the 16th chapter of the Gospel of Luke.

There was a rich man who was dressed in purple and fine linen and lived in luxury every day. At his gate was laid a beggar named Lazarus, covered with sores and longing to eat what fell from the rich man’s table. Even the dogs came and licked his sores. – Luke 16:19-21

Also known as Looking for the Crumbs that Fall from the Rich Man’s Table, the painting depicts a mastiff dozing after enjoying a bone while a hungry terrier salivates. The mastiff represents the rich man in the Gospel reading, whilst the terrier symbolises Lazarus and would be content with some of the scraps the mastiff has left uneaten. Victorian Britain valued morals and would have regarded Landseer’s painting as a denunciation of social inequality.

Landseer displayed Doubtful Crumbs at the Royal Academy, where it was purchased by the art patron Elhanan Bicknell (1788-1861). After Bicknell’s death, the painting went up for auction and was purchased by Richard Seymour-Conway, 4th Marquess of Hertford (1800-70). Seymour-Conway hung the artwork in his home at Hertford House in Manchester Square, London, known today as the Wallace Collection.

Not all of Landseer’s paintings are comical. The Old Shepherd’s Chief Mourner demonstrates a dog’s love for its owner, who has recently passed away. The collie rests his head on the top of the coffin, mournfully contemplating life without his master.

Many Victorians were obsessed with death and the unknown, which Landseer attempted to convey in his heartwrenching painting. Although Landseer meant the dog to demonstrate human emotions, it has since been proved that dogs also feel deep emotions and are devoted to their owners. When viewing the painting, art critic John Ruskin remarked on its “utter hopelessness”, which had a powerful effect on several art collectors. After the artwork went on display at the Royal Academy in 1837, engravings of the scene were published and sold widely the following year.

Landseer’s reputation for animal portraits gained him some prestigious commissions, most notably from Queen Victoria (1819-1901) and her husband, Prince Albert (1819-61). In 1838, Landseer produced a portrait of three of the Queen’s dogs, Hector, Nero and Dash, posing with a parrot called Lory. On seeing the completed painting, Victoria said it was “the most beautiful thing imaginable”.

Hector, the large grey Spanish deerhound, and Nero, the black greyhound, stand to the right of the painting, while Dash, the spaniel, lies on an upholstered stool. Lory, the parrot, stands in the foreground, cracking nuts. Nero belonged to Victoria’s mother, but Hector had been given to Victoria as a puppy in 1835. Dash remained the Queen’s favourite, hence his position on the stool.

Landseer had already painted Dash and Lory before 1838. In the same year, he also produced a portrait of Tilco, Queen Victoria’s Sussex spaniel. In total, Landseer produced over 40 works for Queen Victoria and Prince Albert, many of them featuring their beloved pets.

Not only did Victoria and Albert adore their pets, but they also loved art and drawing. As children, they received drawing lessons, and as adults, they continued to receive tuition under Sir George Hayter (1792-1871). Under Hayter’s guidance, Prince Albert produced his first etching in August 1840 and continued to practice and perfect his technique over the coming months. In October 1840, Albert printed an etching of the head of Queen Victoria’s Dachshund, Waldmann.

Throughout history, artists have included dogs in paintings, whether in genre paintings, landscapes or portraits. Some artists used their pets as subjects, such as William Hogarth (1697-1764), who had many pugs, and Thomas Gainsborough (1727-88). As a countryman, Gainsborough loved dogs, and produced a couple of portraits for their owners. He also painted two of his own dogs, which remained in his family home. Unfortunately, this meant the portrait did not receive a title, and it was only through reading letters and diaries that art historians gave it the name Tristram and Fox.

Gainsborough’s dogs were of two different breeds, but it is difficult to determine which. Fox, who sits on the left, appears to be a type of collie, whilst Tristram, on the right, looks similar to a spaniel. Others suggest that Tristram is a setter, and his height is deceptive because he is lying down. Whatever the breed, it is clear Gainsborough adored his dogs to produce such a realistic and detailed portrait.

Proving that the British continue to love and adore dogs today, contemporary artist David Hockney (b.1937) produced an entire series of paintings dedicated to his two dachshunds, Stanley and Boodgie. Dog Days (1995) comprises 45 artworks of the dogs in various poses. The series took three months to complete, and Hockney set up dozens of easels around his house to quickly capture Stanley and Boodgie’s movements.

Stanley and Boodgie played an important role in Hockney’s life. During the 1980s, Hockney lost many close friends, prompting Hockney to adopt the dogs as a new focus in life while he battled with grief. By the time Hockney produced Dog Days, he considered Stanley and Boodgie his best friends. While the painted dogs are recognisable as dachshunds by their shape, the vivid colours are typical of Hockney’s style. Whilst other artists demonstrated their adoration of animals through detailed portraits, Hockney revealed his love through the number of paintings he produced.

Someone who became known for her love of dogs over the last 70 years was Britain’s longest-serving monarch, Queen Elizabeth II (1926-2022). To coincide with the Portraits of Dogs exhibition and honour the late Queen’s life, the Wallace Collection is hosting a free display of The Queen and her Corgis. Throughout her reign, the Queen owned over 30 Pembroke Welsh corgis, many of whom descended from Susan, who the Queen received for her 18th birthday.

The Queen’s love of corgis began when she and her sister were given a pair called Jane and Dookie in 1933. They instantly became the princesses’ faithful companions, remaining a constant presence throughout their childhood. As Queen, Elizabeth was often photographed with a corgi by her side, as seen in the handful on display at the Wallace Collection.

The Wallace Collection proves that, for many people, dogs are certainly “man’s best friend”. From satirical paintings to commissioned portraits, Portraits of Dogs demonstrates the ways artists show their love for these furry creatures. The artworks are predominately realist and typical of the 18th and 19th centuries, with a couple of contemporary artists thrown in at the end. The Queen and her Corgis exhibits the same love through photographs while remembering a much-loved Queen.

Portraits of Dogs: From Gainsborough to Hockney is open until 15th October 2023. Tickets cost £14, although some concessions are available. Tickets are available to book on the Wallace Collection webiste.

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Poet and Painter

Until 24th September 2023, Tate Britain is hosting an exhibition about the radical Rossetti family, focusing on their attitudes to art, love and lifestyles. Arguably, Dante Gabriel Rossetti is the most famous of the siblings, and his paintings make The Rossettis a remarkable exhibition. It has been over twenty years since Rossetti’s artwork has been on display in retrospective fashion, and it is a fantastic opportunity to see his phenomenal paintings in one location.

Gabriel Charles Dante Rossetti (1828-1882), better known as Dante Gabriel Rossetti, was a poet, illustrator, painter, and founding of the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood. Over a relatively short career, Rossetti influenced both the next generation of artists and poets. He also produced illustrations for works by his sister, Christina, and had close connections with other writers, artists and models.

Rossetti was the second child of Italian scholar Gabriele Pasquale Giuseppe Rossetti (1783-1854) and British educator Frances Mary Lavinia Polidori (1800-86). His elder sister, Maria Francesca Rossetti (1827-76), became a writer and, later, a nun. His younger sister, Christina Georgina Rossetti (1830-94), also became a writer and poet, and his brother, William Michael Rossetti (1829-1919), became a writer and critic. The works of Maria and William pale in comparison to Rossetti’s paintings and Christina’s poems.

As children, the Rossetti siblings were educated at home and aspired to become poets. Rossetti later attended King’s College School in London, where he developed an interest in Medieval Italian art. Whilst continuing to pursue poetry, Rossetti enrolled at Henry Sass’ Drawing Academy and the Royal Academy, which he left in 1848. Following this education, Rossetti became a student of Ford Madox Brown (1821-93), with whom he remained a life-long friend.

In 1848, Rossetti met and befriended William Holman Hunt (1827-1910), with whom he founded the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood. The original Brotherhood consisted of seven members, Rossetti, Holman Hunt, William Rossetti, John Everett Millais (1829-96), James Collinson (1825-81), Frederic George Stephens (1827-1907) and Thomas Woolner (1825-92). They styled themselves as a Nazarene movement, which aimed to revive spirituality in art – although they gradually went beyond that to encompass nature and heartfelt expression, which they believe became lost in the art following the Renaissance.

The Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood began printing a magazine called The Germ in the early 1850s. For the first edition, Rossetti contributed a poem, The Blessed Damozel, which became one of his best-known written works. Inspired by Edgar Allen Poe’s The Raven (1845), Rossetti’s poem depicts a young woman watching down on her lover from heaven until they can both be reunited in death. Several composers created music inspired by the poem, including Claude Debussy (1888), Granville Bantock (1891), Edgar Bainton (1907), Ernest Farrar (1907), Arnold Bax (1906), Benjamin Burrows (1927), and Julius Harrison (1928).

Dante’s earliest major artworks focus on the Virgin Mary, such as Ecce Ancilla Domini (The Annunciation), which he produced in 1850. The painting is based on the account written in the Gospel of Saint Luke about the Angel Gabriel’s visit to Mary, informing her that she would give birth to God’s son. Rossetti’s sister, Christina, posed as Mary, who appears to have just awoken. His brother, William, posed as Gabriel.

Rossetti received mixed reviews about Ecce Ancilla Domini. Some people disliked the break from the traditional method of depicting the Annunciation. Usually, the angel has wings to differentiate it from human life forms, while Mary often prays to God. Nonetheless, art collector Francis McCracken purchased the painting for £50 in 1853, later selling it to the Tate Gallery in 1886.

Unable to take criticism well, Rossetti turned his attention to watercolours and illustration. During the 1850s, Rossetti produced artwork for works of literature, including the poem The Maids of Elfen-Mere (1855) by William Allingham, several stories and poems by his sister, Christina, and Edward Moxon’s 1857 edition of Alfred, Lord Tennyson‘s Poems.

Rossetti’s art took a new direction in 1860, the same year he married Elizabeth Siddal (1826-62). Rossetti first met Siddal in 1850, who became his muse and frequent model. The Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood tended to share their models, so Siddal also appears in works by other artists. Similarly, Rossetti depicted other women, such as Jane Burden (1839-1914), the future wife of William Morris (1834-1896), and Fanny Cornforth (1835-1909). The latter modelled for Bocca Baciata in 1859, which represents the turning point in Rossetti’s style.

Boccia Baciata depicts a close-up image of a woman in a flat pictorial space, which became a recognisable style for Rossetti. The title means “mouth that has been kissed” and comes from an Italian proverb, which says, The mouth that has been kissed does not lose its good fortune: rather, it renews itself just as the moon does. Whilst Rossetti had married Siddal, Cornforth had been his lover, and he frequently painted her as a sensuous figure. 

In 1862, Rossetti’s wife, Elizabeth Siddal, died of an overdose of laudanum following the stillbirth of their child. Rossetti fell into a lengthy bout of depression and buried his unpublished poems in Siddal’s grave at Highgate Cemetry. He later regretted this action and dug them up. Despite her death, Siddal continued to appear in Rossetti’s paintings, such as Beata Beatrix, which he obsessively drew and painted several times between 1863 and 1880. Beata Beatrix depicts Beatrice Portinari from Dante Alighieri’s 1294 poem La Vita Nuova at the moment of her death.

Following Siddal’s death, Rossetti moved to 16 Cheyne Walk in Chelsea, where he lived for the next twenty years. He furnished the house with images of exotic birds and animals and found solace at the nearby London Zoo. Rossetti developed a particular love for wombats and spent hours in the “wombat lair”, eventually purchasing one to live with him at home. Rossetti let his wombat join his guests at the dining table, where it frequently fell asleep in the centrepiece. The number of Rossetti’s peculiar pets gradually grew, including a toucan that dressed as a cowboy and rode a llama around the room.

Meanwhile, Rossetti continued to paint Fanny Cornforth and paid for her lodgings. He also painted Alexa Wilding (1847-84), who he discovered in 1865. Wilding features in several of Rossetti’s later works, including illustrations of his poem The Blessed Damozel. Friends and patrons had suggested Rossetti paint scenes from his poems, but he resisted until 1871. The painting depicts the damozel looking down at her lover from heaven. Rossetti produced a replica of The Blessed Damozel for Frederick Richards Leyland (1831-1892) in 1879, which he hung as a triptych with two other paintings by Rossetti: Mnemosyne and Proserpine, modelled by Jane Burden.

Jane Burden and Rossetti had a lengthy, complicated affair, frequently spending time together at Kelmscott Manor in Oxfordshire. Burden’s husband, William Morris, was fully aware of their liaisons and even let Rossetti spend summers at the manor with Jane and his children. Several Pre-Raphaelite artists conducted romantic flings with their models, and whilst they rarely acknowledged them out loud, most members of the brotherhood knew what was going on.

In 1870, Rossetti published the poems he had rescued from Siddal’s grave. Their erotic and sensual nature caused offence and controversy. Although some of his contemporaries wrote poems of a similar nature, for example, William Morris, Robert Buchanan (1841-1901) and Algernon Charles Swinburne (1837-1909), the Victorian world was not ready for such themes. The rejection of his first book of poetry contributed to Rossetti’s mental breakdown in 1872, and he “spent his days in a haze of chloral and whisky”.

Rossetti’s mental health improved in 1873, and he continued painting portraits of Jane Burden and Alexa Wilding. His paintings during the 1870s became rather soulful and dreamlike, perhaps reflecting his mood. Rossetti became addicted to the hypnotic drug, chloral hydrate, which may also explain his choice of subject.

Unfortunately, Rossetti’s regained mental strength was short-lived. In 1874, Morris cut Rossetti out of his business, which Rossetti had helped establish in 1861. As a result, Rossetti was no longer welcome at Kelmscott Manor, and his affair with Jane could not be maintained. Although he continued to paint, using Jane as a model, his health gradually deteriorated as he became more reliant on drugs to lift his spirits.

By 1800, Rossetti lived in a permanent morbid state. In a last attempt to recover from his chloral addiction, Rossetti stayed at the country house of a friend. While there, he passed away on Easter Sunday in 1882. Although Rossetti’s official cause of death was Bight’s disease, a serious kidney condition, the copious amount of chloral hydrate and alcohol in his system sped up his demise. Close friends and relatives believe his drug addiction began as a means of alleviating pain, and he drank alcohol to take away the taste of the drug.

Despite Rossetti’s early death at the age of 53, he completed a huge body of work during his career, including almost 100 paintings and eight books of poems and translations. Several galleries in Britain own some of his paintings, including Tate Britain, Manchester Art Gallery and Wightwick Manor. In 1966, artists in Newcastle formed the Rossetti Society, of which L. S. Lowry (1887-1976) became president in 1976. Lowry’s private collection of art began as a collection of Rossetti’s paintings and drawings.

The Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood received a lot of criticism for being different from the traditional art styles taught in schools. Their income came from devoted patrons who promoted their art in small circles. After Rossetti’s death, his paintings and poetry gradually increased in popularity. Today, many art fans can identify Rossetti’s work from his choice of colour, subject matter and women.

Dante Gabriel Rossetti’s life continues to inspire contemporary artists, and he has been the subject of a handful of films and period dramas. In 1967, Oliver Reed (1938-1999) starred as Rossetti in Dante’s Inferno: The Private Life of Dante Gabriel Rossetti, Poet and Painter, which tells the story of Rossetti’s relationship with Siddal. In 1975, Ben Kingsley (b.1943) portrayed Rossetti in The Love School, which focuses on the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood. More recently, Aidan Turner (b.1983) played Rossetti in the 2009 drama Desperate Romantics.

Fans of Dante Gabriel Rossetti must not miss The Rossettis at Tate Britain. It is an opportunity to see Rossetti’s paintings, illustrations and sketches up close and examine the fascinating myths surrounding the unconventional relationships between Rossetti and his models. The exhibition also sheds some light on Christina Rossetti’s career as a writer and reveals Elizabeth Siddal’s ambitions to become an artist.

The Rossettis is open until 24th September 2023. Tickets cost £22, although concessions are available. Advanced booking is recommended.

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Berthe Morisot

Until 10th September 2023, Dulwich Picture Gallery is hosting the first major UK exhibition of a trailblazing Impressionist since 1950. Lesser known than her male contemporaries, Berthe Morisot helped found the Impressionist group and was featured in many of the group’s exhibitions. As a woman, she defied social norms and demonstrated an original artistic vision, which inspired and influenced other artists.

Berthe Marie Pauline Morisot was born on 14th January 1841 in Bourges, France. Her father, Edmé Tiburce Morisot, was a senior administrator but also had connections with the École des Beaux-Arts. Her mother, Marie-Joséphine-Cornélie Thomas, was the great-niece of the Rococo painter Jean-Honoré Fragonard (1732-1806). This artistic background inspired Berthe and her siblings, Yves, Edma and Tiburce, and it was commonplace for children of bourgeois families to receive an art education.

Morisot and her sisters received private art lessons from Geoffroy-Alphonse Chocarne and Joseph Guichard (1806-88). The latter introduced them to paintings at the Louvre and encouraged the girls to study and copy some of the famous artworks. Whilst Yves and Edma married and moved away, Berthe Morisot found work as a copyist at the Louvre, where she met and befriended other artists, including Claude Monet (1840-1926), Édouard Manet (1832-83) and Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot (1796-1875). Under Corot’s tuition, Morisot began painting en plein air rather than from other compositions.

Initially, Morisot worked with watercolours in restrained colours. Social norms of the 19th century deemed women incapable of using other mediums, such as oils, due to their delicate nature. Morisot disproved this stereotype after fellow Impressionist painters encouraged her to experiment with oils and chalk. When working outside, Morisot preferred to create quick impressions in watercolour paint before returning to the studio to complete the scenes.

Through her connection with Édouard Manet, Morisot met his brother, Eugène, who she married in 1874. Whilst Eugène Manet (1833-92) was a painter, he did not receive as much recognition as his older brother. Instead, he devoted his life to supporting his wife’s career. Morisot and Manet had one child, Julie (1878-1966), who frequently modelled for her mother and other Impressionist artists.

Morisot also painted her husband, although not as frequently as her daughter, noting that “he is a less obliging model; at once it becomes too much for him.” One of Morisot’s first paintings of her husband is Eugène Manet on the Isle of Wight (1875), which she painted during their honeymoon. Manet sits in their sitting room, watching the Cowes Regatta through the window.

Art from the 18th century particularly inspired Morisot. She admired the work of Joshua Reynolds (1723-92) and Thomas Gainsborough (1727-88), notably their portraits. Rather than adopt their style, Morisot explored other ways of capturing appearances. She experimented with pastel and red chalk, plus developed an oil painting technique with long, flowing strokes of colour. Instead of exemplifying female beauty, as previous artists had done, Morisot emphasised the inner lives of her female models, introducing a new feminine perspective to art.

Morisot demonstrated her feminine perspective in paintings of young women dressing, such as The Mirror (1876), in which the model contemplates her reflection. Whilst Morisot wished to depict women in a less objectifying manner, her artwork needed to appeal to a predominantly male art market. Morisot blended the interior scenes of 18th-century artists with a gentler sensibility than the overtly sensual and sometimes erotic paintings by male painters.

“My ambition was limited to wanting to capture something of what goes by, just something, the smallest thing.” Although Morisot used models for some of her paintings, she preferred to capture fleeting moments, as did most Impressionist artists. Several of her artworks demonstrate the fragile beauty of life through transient light effects. Painting en plein air helped artists capture natural light, but when unable to venture outside, Morisot retreated to the reception room of her Paris home, which contained a large south-facing window that let in the constantly shifting daylight.

To paint her daughter as a child, Morisot gave Julie something to amuse herself and to prevent her from growing bored. In Children with a Basin (1886), Morisot captured Julie and her friend Marthe pretending to fish for goldfish in a large Chinese porcelain bowl. The girls sat in the family sitting room, where daylight from the large window reflected on the water of their pretend pond. When able to play outside, Morisot captured her daughter climbing trees or telling stories to whoever would listen.

Another of Morisot’s frequent models was her niece, Paule Gobillard (1867-1946). Being older than Julie, Paule was more amenable to sitting for lengths of time, but Morisot also captured her mid-task as though unaware of Morisot’s presence. Paule Gobillard Painting (1887) is set in Morisot’s sitting room, where her 20-year-old niece concentrates on her work. The stillness of Paule’s body contrasts with the rapid movement of her right arm, which paints the canvas in front of her.

For both Julie and Paule, Morisot acted as a mentor as well as mother and aunt. Morisot encouraged their art education and obtained permission for Paule to copy paintings in the Louvre under her supervision. Paule lived with Morisot from 1893 after her mother, Yves Morisot, passed away. This arrangement made it easier for Morisot to assist Paule with her artistic career, although Paule remained relatively unknown on the art scene. Paule also received tuition from Pierre-Auguste Renoir (1841-1919), for whom she also modelled.

Before Morisot could help her daughter Julie produce and exhibit her artwork, Morisot passed away from pneumonia on 2nd March 1895. At only 16 years old, Julie became an orphan, having already lost her father to ill health in 1892. As a result, Julie came under the guardianship of the poet and critic Stéphane Mallarmé (1842-1898). Although she received some support from Renoir, Mallarmé encouraged writing more than painting. Later in life, Julie published her teenage diary entitled Growing up with the Impressionists, which provided significant insights into the lives of several French painters. She also mentioned the Dreyfus affair in which Captain Alfred Dreyfus, of Jewish descent, was convicted of treason for a crime committed by Ferdinand Walsin Esterhazy. Julie’s book gave eye-opening accounts of the opinions of her family and friends, particularly Renoir’s patriotic and antisemitic views.

One of Berthe Morisot’s last paintings of her daughter was Julie Manet and her Greyhound Laertes (1893). Dressed in black, the 14-year-old mourns the recent loss of her father, emphasised further by the lightly sketched empty chair to her right. The greyhound, Laertes, was a present from Mallarmé to cheer up and comfort the young girl following her father’s death. Little did anyone know that less than two years later, Julie would lose her mother, too.

Dulwich Picture Gallery demonstrates Morisot’s progress as an artist and her struggle to be taken seriously. Morisot’s paintings were often labelled as full of “feminine charm” by male critics, to which Morisot responded, “I don’t think there has ever been a man who treated a woman as an equal, and that’s all I would have asked for, for I know I’m worth as much as they.” Yet, Morisot’s work did have a certain charm due to her light, delicate brushwork, which critics named effleurer.

As Morisot’s career and reputation progressed, she experimented with longer, slender brushstrokes. She often left the edges of her paintings unfinished, allowing the canvas to show through. This technique emphasised the sitter or subject and increased the sense of spontaneity. Morisot rarely used large canvases. The smaller the background, the easier it was to capture scenes quickly.

Morisot’s paintings reflected women’s lives in the 19th century, including scenes of domesticity, children and flowers. She preferred private scenes rather than the hustle and bustle of the outdoors. When she did venture outside, her artwork depicted mainly landscapes, gardens, and boating scenes. The figures in these scenes, particularly women, evoked a sense of ennui or boredom, suggesting women’s lives outside the home were not that exciting. Morisot lived at a time when most girls and women needed a chaperone to visit local places and were not permitted to join in any “male” activities.

Throughout her career, Morisot kept in touch with other Impressionist painters and participated in annual exhibitions from 1874 onwards, except for 1878, when Julie was born. Commenting on the first exhibition, critic Albert Wolff wrote in Le Figaro that the show consisted of “five or six lunatics of which one is a woman…[whose] feminine grace is maintained amid the outpourings of a delirious mind.” As Impressionism gradually became accepted as a style of art, attitudes changed towards the artists, although Morisot’s “feminity” continued to dominate her reviews.

Despite her gender, critics began to appreciate Morisot’s work. In 1877, one critic commented that she was the “one real Impressionist in this group.” By using her maiden name instead of her married name, Manet, Morisot earned praise for her artistic abilities rather than her connections with well-known (male) artists.

Only 30 of Morisot’s paintings and drawings feature in the exhibition at the Dulwich Picture Gallery. Her work is interspersed with other artworks by artists such as Reynolds, Gainsborough and Fragonard, who inspired Morisot’s work. On the one hand, it is useful to compare the paintings and understand Morisot’s thought processes, yet it also makes a mockery of 19th-century society, in which women could not succeed without male connections. Nonetheless, the exhibition also demonstrates Morisot’s artistic vision, which separates her from her predecessors. Whilst she learnt by copying famous artworks, she used the studies to form original ideas and techniques.

Berthe Morisot: Shaping Impressionism is proving popular for art lovers of all ages, so it is advisable to book tickets in advance due to the limited capacity at the gallery. Tickets cost £15, although some concessions are available. The exhibition is open until 10th September 2023.

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Inventing Modern Art

For the next few months, visitors to the National Gallery have the opportunity to discover what happened when artists broke with established traditions to create new art movements. After Impressionism: Inventing Modern Art spans the decades between 1880 and the First World War. Impressionism had already shaken the art world, encouraging other artists to experiment with new, modern ideas. The exhibition explores Neo-Impressionism, radical non-naturalist styles, avant-garde artists, Fauvism and Cubism with examples from well-known artists.

The exhibition begins with The Sacred Grove (1884/9) by Pierre Puvis de Chavannes (1824-1891), who Vincent van Gogh dubbed “the master of us all”. The mural-like painting depicts an ancient grove populated by the muses of the arts. Whilst the scene is a nod towards classical art, the simplified forms, flattened areas and limited colour palette are examples of the ways artists of the 19th century broke away with tradition.

The Museum of Fine Arts in Lyon commissioned Puvis to produce a painting for public display, which served both educational and patriotic purposes. Political opinion still divided France between the Republicans and the Royalists, so the gallery hoped for something to unite the two factions and create a new identity for the country. Critics described The Sacred Grove as a Utopia, and whilst some disliked the limited colours, it gave the painting a dream-like quality.

Puvis included the nine Greek muses and a few nymphs and angels, which makes it difficult for some viewers to determine the figures’ identities. It is generally agreed that Polyhymnia of Rhetoric, Clio of History and Calliope of Epic Poetry are seated in the centre of the painting. Thalia of Comedy and Terpsichore of Dance are in deep discussion towards the left while Euterpe of Music and Erato of Love Songs fly above. Melpomene of Tragedy is recognisable from her dark clothes and melancholic pose, while Urania of Astronomy lies on the riverside.

Bathers, painted between 1894 and 1906 by Paul Cezanne (1839-1906), demonstrates Neo-Impressionism, which evolved from Impressionism. Whilst Cezanne drew upon classical pastoral and nude scenes, his execution is rather crude and the bodies distorted. The painting depicts a frieze of eleven naked women relaxing in a woodland glade, which some liken to Titian’s Diana and Actaeon (1559), although Cezanne had no mythological motive.

Cezanne’s artwork is flat and compressed. Although each woman is distinct, their featureless bodies appear as a single mass when viewed from different angles. The scene is predominantly built up from shades of blue, contrasted with touches of orange and brown. Darker blues indicate shadows and trees, which adds perspective to the otherwise flat canvas.

Bathers appeared in the Cezanne memorial exhibition held the year after his death in 1907, which attracted the likes of Henri Matisse and Pablo Picasso. Critics argue whether Cezanne’s crude portrayal of the human body was deliberate or whether he lacked skill. Cezanne once admitted he felt too shy to hire models, so he relied on paintings in galleries for inspiration.

Although opinions were divided over Cezanne’s work, it is evident he influenced many people. Homage to Cézanne (1900) by Maurice Denis (1874-1943) depicts a scene in the shop of the art dealer Ambroise Vollard (1866-1939), who is selling Cezanne’s still-life Fruit Bowl, Glass and Apples. Vollard stands behind the easel, keeping it upright while a crowd of men gather to view the artwork.

The majority of the figures in Homage to Cézanne represent Les Nabis, a group of artists who transitioned from Impressionism to abstract art. They admired Cezanne’s work for its bright, almost unnatural colours. Artists depicted by Denis include Édouard Vuillard, Paul Ranson, Ker-Xavier Roussel and Pierre Bonnard. Denis also inserted a self-portrait and, on the right-hand side, his wife, Marthe. The two men in the foreground are Paul Sérusier and the symbolist painter Odilon Redon. The former is attempting to explain why Les Nabis enjoy Cezanne’s works.

Ironically, Denis’ Homage to Cézanne turns away from the Neo-Impressionist style and Les Nabis by reverting to classicism. Denis produced the painting after a visit to Rome, where he studied classical sculpture and artwork. On his return, Denis argued that classicism was at the core of French cultural tradition. Following a final exhibition in 1900, Les Nabis decided to go their separate ways.

The painting depicted in Homage to Cézanne originally belonged to Paul Gauguin (1848-1903), another artist Les Nabis admired. The exhibition features a handful of works by Gauguin, including Vision After the Sermon (1888), which portrays the Biblical scene of Jacob wrestling with an angel (Genesis 32:22-32). Gauguin initially followed the Impressionist movement but became disillusioned towards the end of the 1880s. Instead, Gauguin preferred a simplified style that reflected his passion for primitive objects and Japanese prints. As a result, Gauguin became the leader of a small group of artists known as Synthesists.

Synthetism was a type of symbolism focusing on artists’ feelings about their subject and the aesthetic considerations of line, colour and form. Painters of this style included Gauguin, Bonnard, Charles Laval, Cuno Amiet and Maurice Denis, the latter of whom summarised synthetism: It is well to remember that a picture before being a battle horse, a nude woman, or some anecdote, is essentially a flat surface covered with colours assembled in a certain order.

The influence of Japanese prints is evident in the red background of Vision After the Sermon. Rather than painting a conventional landscape, Gauguin used a flat colour upon which the exaggerated shapes of the figures stand out. Although he used shading on the clothing of the Breton women witnessing the fight between Jacob and the angel, the colours are minimal. The flat tree trunk across the centre of the painting separates the women from the Biblical event, symbolising the women are either having a vision, praying or thinking about the story in the sermon they have just received.

Gauguin spent several years in Breton, evidenced by the women in Vision After the Sermon. Around the same time, he visited his friend, Vincent Van Gogh (1853-90), in Arles. Van Gogh was a troubled soul who spent his later years in southern France before being confined to a mental institution following Gauguin’s visit. Van Gogh did not belong to a particular art movement, but his work inspired many, including the Fauves and the Expressionists.

The authenticity of Sunset at Montmajour (1888) remained questioned for many years after Van Gogh’s death because it was one of the few paintings he did not sign. It depicts scrub land with the ruins of Montmajour Abbey in the background. Van Gogh’s style is distinctive, with bright colours and thick, directional strokes. The authenticity of the painting was confirmed in a letter Van Gogh sent to his brother Theo, in which he described the yellow rays over the bushes as a “shower of gold” and the distant fields as blue and purple.

Working at a similar time to Van Gogh and Gauguin, although in a completely different style, was Hilaire-Germain-Edgar Degas (1834-1917). Degas is predominantly associated with paintings of ballerinas, but he also focused on women in general, such as in Combing the Hair (‘La Coiffure’) (1896). Rather than asking women to pose for him, Degas captured women in secret to create a natural, innocent portrait.

Women combing their hair features in more than one of Degas’ paintings, but this is the only one that uses unnatural colours. Degas limited his palette to fiery orange-reds, a creamy white and black. Apart from a curtain, the background contains no detail, making the ordinary scene feel claustrophobic. The choice of colour suggests the lady had naturally red hair, but it is perhaps also a metaphor for the pain the woman felt while her maid brushed out the matted hair.

Some sections of Combing the Hair are more defined than others. The maid’s clothing contains more detail than the woman in red, who is either pregnant or misshapen. Some claim the picture is unfinished, but others note that Degas suffered from poor sight during his later years, making drawing and painting difficult tasks. His lack of eyesight may explain his choice of colour, which is much stronger than the pastel tones usually associated with Degas.

Two years after Degas’ death, the Fauvist painter Henri Matisse (1869-1954) purchased Combing the Hair, no doubt attracted to the bright, unnatural colour. Unlike Degas, Matisse frequently used models and sitters, as seen in his Portrait of Greta Moll (1908). Moll was a sculptor who attended Matisse’s art school, which opened in 1908. Moll had previously had her portrait taken by Lovis Corinth (1858-1925), which Matisse disliked. Matisse offered to paint a better portrait for 1000 francs, although with no obligation to buy it if Moll prefered Corinth’s attempt.

Three years before painting Greta Moll, the 1905 Salon d’Automne in Paris labelled Matisse and his associates Les Fauves, which meant “the wild beasts”. The term referenced Matisse’s use of bright colours, frenetic brushstrokes and broken lines. By 1908, Matisse wanted to distance himself from the label and understood that a portrait needed to be recognisable, although he still wished to use expressive colours.

Although Moll posed for over three hours, Matisse produced a simplified depiction of the human body. Rather than focusing on detail, Matisse concentrated on the placement of colour, for instance, the warm reddish-brown of Moll’s hair next to the cool blue background.

French artist Georges Seurat (1859-91) also focused on the placement of colour. Seurat devised painting techniques known as chromoluminarism and pointillism, which separated colour and form into tiny dots. The Channel of Gravelines, Grand Fort-Philippe (1890) is the only example of Seurat’s work in the exhibition and dates to the year before his untimely death. Seurat spent a great deal of time on the coast of the Channel, producing landscapes of small port towns, such as Gravelines. Unlike Matisse’s expressive use of colour, Seurat preferred subdued tones.

The Channel of Gravelines, Grand Fort-Philippe is much paler than Seurat’s earlier works, which makes the scene feel deserted. The painting is divided into sky and land, which helps create a sense of depth in an otherwise flat artwork. Only on close inspection are the tiny, pointillist dots visible on the canvas. From a distance, the sky and harbour appear as a wash of colour.

The concentration and colour of the dots produce the outlines and very subtle shading on the boat and houses in Seurat’s landscape. Seurat reserved the darker colours for a painted border, which creates a transition between the painting and the frame. To compliment the shades in the scene, Seurat used deep indigo on the lower frame, reflecting the sky above, and yellow on the upper frame, in reference to the sand below. Several artists adopted Seurat’s technique, including the frame, but the style was short-lived, perhaps due to the painstaking method of producing thousands of tiny dots.

In 1897, a group of Austrian painters formed the Vienna Succession, another short-lived art movement. Before the group split in 1905, it attracted many up-and-coming artists, including Gustav Klimt (1862-1918), known for his use of gold leaf in paintings. Yet, the only painting by Klimt in a British public collection contains no golden features.

Portrait of Hermine Gallia (1904) depicts a wealthy Jewish lady who wanted to establish herself in a predominately Catholic society. Gallia chose Klimt to produce her portrait because he was the most avant-garde and expensive artist of the time. Being able to afford to hire Klimt emphasised Gallia’s wealth and suggested she did not hesitate to embrace modern ideas.

Klimt paid little attention to Gallia’s face, instead concentrating on the pose and fashionable dress. Instead of using gold leaf, as in his seductive portraits of women, Klimt focused on the layers of translucent creamy white chiffon. Many believe Klimt selected or designed the dress specifically for Gallia’s portrait, despite it being a challenging material to paint. Klimt successfully depicted the outfit with long sweeping brushstrokes of thin paint, which allowed the priming of the canvas to show through, creating a translucent effect.

Max Pechstein’s (1881-1955) Portrait of Charlotte Cuhrt (1910) demonstrates another method of portraiture of the early 20th century. Also described as an avant-garde painter like Klimt, Pechstein developed an Expressionist style influenced by Van Gogh and Matisse. He used dynamic brush strokes and highly saturated colours, which became a crucial feature of the artistic group Die Brücke (The Bridge) that he joined in 1906.

The full-length portrait depicts 15-year-old Charlotte Cuhrt in a bright red dress, sitting confidently in an armchair. Her dark hat and flamboyant ring emphasise her status as the daughter of the successful solicitor, Max Cuhrt. The flat background contrasts with the shaded lines of Cuhrt’s clothing, making her appear three-dimensional in a two-dimensional world.

The shape of the canvas fit an altar-like frame, which added to the decorative scheme of Max Cuhrt’s apartment. The architect, Bruno Schneidereit, described the flat as a Gesamtkunstwerk (a total work of art) because every aspect of architecture, furniture and decoration coexisted in aesthetic harmony. Pechstein assisted Schneidereit with the design so that he would understand how his portrait of Charlotte would complete the room.

The final room of the exhibition introduced artists such as André Derain (1880-1954), Georges Braque (1882-1963), Pablo Picasso (1881-1973) and Piet Mondrian (1872-1944), who led the way forward in modern art. Before the World Wars, Braque and Picasso established Cubism, which offered an alternative way of portraying the world through fragmented shapes. Mondrian also embraced Cubism but went on to develop abstract art and De Stijl. As modern art became accepted, artists felt free to experiment with different styles and rarely stuck to one movement throughout their career. This is evident in Picasso’s work, which entered a Surrealist phase after the Second World War.

It is impossible to define modern art because there are so many branches, as shown in the After Impressionism exhibition. To say that modern art is everything that came after Impressionism does not enlighten anyone. The National Gallery attempts to chronologically reveal the progression of art, but it quickly becomes evident that there is no linear timeline. Styles came and went and inspired new methods, while some artists, for instance, Matisse, briefly stepped backwards to produce portraits for specific clients.

The National Gallery recommends allowing an hour to visit the After Impressionism exhibition. Some visitors may prefer to stay longer or return another day because there is so much to take in. Modern art does not appeal to everyone, but the curators have enabled visitors to appreciate why styles changed and what inspired the artists involved.

After Impressionism: Inventing Modern Art is open until 13th August 2013. Standard admission costs between £24 and £26, although concessions are available. Members of the National Gallery can visit the exhibition for free.

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The Colourful World of David McKee

Until 16th April 2023, the Horniman Museum in London is holding a retrospective of the late David McKee’s colourful illustrations. Mckee was a British author of children’s books, most notably Elmer the Patchwork Elephant. Since its publication in 1968, the original Elmer book has sold over ten million copies worldwide, making it one of the most-read children’s books. McKee is also responsible for other much-loved characters, such as Not Now Bernard, King Rollo and Mr Benn.

David John McKee was born on 2nd January 1935 in Tavistock, Devon. He attended the Plymouth College of Art, where he subsidised his studies by selling cartoons to newspapers. After graduating, McKee continued to produce regular artwork for national publications, such as the Reader’s Digest, the Times Educational Supplement and Punch, a satirical magazine. In 1964, McKee published his first children’s book, Two Can Toucan.

McKee first published Elmer the Patchwork Elephant with Dobson Books in 1968, although he re-issued a shortened version with Andersen Press in 1989. Elmer is not like other elephants with their grey, nondescript skin. Instead, the cheerful creature sports a patchwork of different colours: yellow, orange, red, pink, purple, blue, green, black and white. Despite the difference between Elmer and his peers, he remains an optimistic fellow with a rather mischievous streak.

The original Elmer book is notable for its exploration of cultural diversity. Although Elmer did not mind looking different, he wondered what it would be like to look like all the other elephants. One day, he decided to paint himself grey and blend in with the others. None of the elephants recognised Elmer, nor did the other animals in the story. Unable to take the silence, Elmer shouted “BOO”, making all the elephants jump. They immediately knew Elmer from his voice and fell about laughing. The elephants congratulated Elmer on his best joke ever and laughed even more when it began to rain, washing away the grey paint.

Elmer’s friends reassured him that they preferred his multicoloured and fun-loving personality. They proposed to name the day Elmer painted himself grey “Elmer Day”. Each year on “Elmer Day”, Elmer painted himself grey while the other elephants decorated themselves with multicoloured paint.

Primary schools, libraries and bookshops across the UK have adopted “Elmer Day” to “celebrate everyone’s true colours”. Everyone is unique in their appearance and the way they think and feel. “Elmer Day” encourages children to accept other people’s differences. Since 2016, “Elmer Day” has been celebrated at the end of May, roughly coinciding with the anniversary of the 1989 re-print.

Following the re-print of Elmer in 1989, McKee published 42 more books about the colourful elephant, starting with Elmer Again in 1991 and ending with Elmer and the Gift in 2022. In 2020, McKee won the BookTrust Lifetime Achievement award and the British Book Awards Nibbies Illustrator of the Year. McKee never expected to win, stating he had “never been one for the spotlight or winning awards,” yet nine years earlier, he was awarded an Honorary Doctorate of Arts from Plymouth College of Art.

In 2019, Elmer took to the stage in the Elmer The Patchwork Elephant Show, adapted by Suzanne Miller and featuring songs by Allison Leyton-Brown. Although the show was primarily for entertainment, it contained a subtle message about being yourself. Later that year, the London Symphony Orchestra held an interactive storytelling session, recreating the 40th book in the series, Elmer’s Walk (2018), with music and dance.

In 2014, The Guardian named Elmer an LGBTQ+ icon. Although the movement celebrates sexual equality, the newspaper felt Elmer a fitting mascot due to his message of true colours, acceptance and inclusivity. Two years later, Elmer became the face of Just Like Us, an LGBTQ+ young people’s charity that aims to tackle homophobic, biphobic, and transphobic bullying in schools. Every year, schools are encouraged to participate in School Diversity Week, which celebrates pupils’ differences.

This year, 2023, Elmer has partnered with Alzheimer’s Research UK. McKee’s final book in the series, Elmer and the Gift (2022), deals with the effects of memory loss. Elmer’s Aunt Zelda has a gift to give Elmer from his Grandpa Eldo, but she cannot remember what or where it is. Although Zelda’s memory and hearing are often poor, Elmer helps her search for the missing present while displaying love, patience and respect for his elderly relative. Many young readers may recognise some of the themes in their families, particularly if a loved one is suffering from dementia or Alzheimer’s disease.

Alzheimer’s Research UK aims to raise awareness of dementia and how people can help care for sufferers. Book sales also help raise money for the charity, which supports families and individuals, plus supplies funding for scientists searching for a cure, treatment or prevention of the disease. To increase support, Hollywood actor Will Pouter (b. 1993) recorded himself reading the book, which will be available online. When interviewed, Poulter revealed, “I loved reading the story of Elmer and the Gift in support of Alzheimer’s Research UK. Thousands of families are impacted by dementia and talking about it to friends and family of any age is incredibly difficult. David McKee’s Elmer the Patchwork Elephant is colourful, trusted, and nostalgic for many parents, making the story a great way to start these important conversations with little ones.”

Elmer is not McKee’s only creation. Predating the colourful elephant is Mr Benn, a man recognised for his black suit and bowler hat. The first of the four original Mr Benn books, Mr Benn Red Knight, was published in 1967 and became an animated television show in 1971. The majority of the stories, both in the books and on television, feature a similar pattern. Every day, Mr Benn leaves his house at 52 Festive Road, London, and visits a fancy dress shop. On each visit, he tries on a different outfit, which transports him to an appropriate world. In the first story, Mr Benn tries on a red knight’s armour and finds himself face-to-face with a dragon. On another occasion, he travels to several weird and wonderful planets while dressed as an astronaut.

McKee intended to write six Mr Benn books, but only four were published: Mr Benn Red Knight, Big Game Benn, 123456789 Benn, and Big Top Benn. McKee adapted the fifth book, Mr Benn Rides Again, for television and the sixth, Superbenn, never became more than an idea. In 2001, McKee eventually published a new story, Mr Benn – Gladiator. In the same year, Tess Read published Mr Benn’s Little Book of Life, which examined the Mr Benn stories, particularly the moral messages. With the Mr Benn series, and the later Elmer books, McKee subliminally added life lessons for children.

Between 1971 and 1972, McKee wrote, illustrated and animated 13 Mr Benn episodes for the BBC. Each episode lasted 15 minutes, with Ray Brooks (b. 1939) providing the narration. In 2005, the BBC released an animated version of the final book in the series, Mr Benn – Gladiator. 

In 1978, McKee established King Rollo Films, an animation production company which continues to produce children’s cartoons up to the present day. The studio began with King Rollo, based on a series of books by McKee. Rollo is a childish king who always needs advice and assistance from his friends. In the first book, King Rollo and the New Shoes (1979), Rollo gets his first pair of lace-up shoes. After a lot of patience from Rollo’s friend, the magician, plus a lot of shouting and banging from Rollo, the king eventually learns how to tie his new shoes.

King Rollo Films expanded to include animations by other illustrators, including The Adventures of Spot (1987), Maisy (1999-2000), and Poppy Cat (2011). McKee occasionally worked as a writer for these shows.

Elmer, Mr Benn and King Rollo are considered children’s classic picture books, as is McKee’s 1980 story Not Now, Bernard. The publisher, Andersen Press, initially had reservations about the book because they thought it might frighten children and cause controversy. Yet, Not Now, Bernard has been translated into more than 20 languages and has never been out of print.

Not Now, Bernard is about a young boy who wants attention from his preoccupied parents. After being told “Not now, Bernard”, he ventures into the garden, where he is eaten by a monster. The badly behaved monster pretends to be Bernard for the rest of the day, but the parents never notice. Finally, the monster tries to tell Bernard’s mother that he is a monster, but all she replies is “Not now, Bernard”.

Some schools banned Not Now, Bernard for violence, but that did not stop it from becoming a popular story. The Guardian described it as a “cautionary tale of the perils of ignoring children”, and actress Sheila Hancock (b. 1933) claimed the book “demonstrates that parents can be naughty too” and “when we don’t listen to people, monsters can take over”.

McKee divided his time between London and southern France, where he lived with his partner Bakhta, a French-Algerian art dealer. The couple had a shared interest in collecting drawings and African tribal art. McKee had three children from his first marriage to Barbara Ennuss and once lived at 54 Festing Road, Putney, which served as inspiration for Mr Benn’s house at 52 Festive Road. McKee did not earn a great deal from his books and animations, particularly Mr Benn, for which he accepted a lump sum rather than earn royalties. McKee revealed in an interview that Bakhta shared his outlook on money. “She’s just a happy person and doesn’t ask for anything. If we walk hand in hand that’s enough.” Yet, McKee did buy a Picasso ceramic bowl for £300, knowing it was worth £1,000.

David McKee died on 6th April 2022 after a short illness. Although he did not believe he deserved the BookTrust lifetime achievement award, he definitely earned it. Evidenced by the recent Horniman exhibition, Elmer the Elephant is here to stay and continues to be adapted for the present day. Mckee’s books entertained children for decades, and towards the end of his career, McKee helped other characters, such as Michael Bond’s Paddington Bear, reach new audiences by providing illustrations for updated stories. No doubt Elmer the Elephant will receive the same treatment in the future as he continues to support inclusivity and Alzheimer’s Research UK.

If you wish to visit the Elmer and Friends exhibition at the Horniman Museum, tickets are available until 16th April 2023. Entry is £5 for adults and £3 for children, although family deals are available. Please visit the Horniman website for more details.

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My blogs are now available to listen to as podcasts on the following platforms: Anchor, Breaker, Google Podcasts, Pocket Casts and Spotify.

If you would like to support my blog, become a Patreon from £5p/m or “buy me a coffee” for £3. Thank You!