'I really hate the word erased'
Another View: Landscapes by Women Artists at the Lady Lever Art Gallery, If Walls Could Talk by Daniel Meakin in Birkenhead, Preston Caribbean Carnival, ¡Ole! Flamenco photography in Manchester
If you walk into the Lady Lever’s new exhibition of women’s landscape painting expecting to hear how female artists have been erased from history, then it’s time to think again. “I really hate the word ‘erased’,” says Melissa Gustin, Curator of British Art at National Museums Liverpool. “I think ‘overlooked’ is about as far as I’m willing to say on that.”
The art world, and women’s place in it, had evolved by the mid-19th century. Women - at least those with the time and money - had access to art training and were widely exhibited. To take just one example, Harriet Gouldsmith (1787-1863), who is considered to be the first woman professional landscape painter, and whose oil painting Magna Carta Island, Berkshire features in the show, exhibited her work in London more than 200 times.
“These were widely recognised, highly professionalised women. They exhibited constantly,” says Melissa. “The Walker and the Lady Lever were acquiring them from exhibitions back in the very early-20th century. Helen Allingham is named in Vincent Van Gogh’s letters to his friends and his brother saying ‘oh that woman, there’s this great print that I saw by her’.”
Arranged chronologically, Another View starts in the 18th century when women artists tended to be seen as ‘lady amateurs’ and were usually from wealthy backgrounds that allowed them the freedom to explore the landscape and their work. But the following century saw the reputation of women artists shift, and training was no longer reserved for those with independent means. John Ruskin founded his Drawing School for ‘ordinary men and women’ in Oxford in 1871, and state art schools offering free tuition were also established in Liverpool, Manchester and elsewhere.
So why then, is there an idea in the public consciousness that women landscape artists have been forgotten? The curators point to two reasons.
Firstly, Melissa says: “A lot of these artists were working at a time when exhibition culture was exploding. The Royal Academy in the 19th century would have 1,200 to 1,400 exhibitors. There were simply so many artists exhibiting that no one person could know them all, and about a quarter to a third of them would be women. They were reviewed, their art was purchased.
“There are always going to be more artists than people can know about. Not everybody gets to be Turner.”
Ah there, it is, the second reason. Turner, Constable and other ‘genius artists’ who formed the 20th century view of British landscape painting.
Jessie Petheram, the exhibition’s co-curator, says: “The narrative of art history had in the 20th century become very focussed on genius and men and big names, and so it meant that anyone who wasn’t one of those big names, whether women or not, were left off those lists of Turner, Constable, Paul Nash…”
The only genuinely forgotten artist in Another View is Elizabeth Campbell (1783-1861), whose striking watercolours of Mont Blanc remained inside her sketchbooks kept by members of her family for more than 100 years until they were recently acquired from a dealer by National Museums Liverpool. An archaeologist and mountaineer, she travelled throughout Europe with her daughter, sketching the landscape.
“That was a real discovery to bring those into the collection and shine a light on a woman who I suspect wasn’t as atypical as we might think,” says Jessie. “We think women were all just inside during that period but it’s not true and this exhibition is designed to show that.”
There are too many other highlights to list here, but among them are Vanessa Bell’s sun-kissed The Vineyard, Elizabeth Christie Austen Brown’s colour woodcut Sunset by the Lake with its pale, almost imperceptible crescent moon, and Sheila Fell’s House Near Number Five Pit, an oil painting of the mine near her home in Aspatria, Cumbria, which the Walker purchased from the 1957 John Moores Painting Prize exhibition.
And it feels almost daring to stand for long in front of Ethel Walker’s Seascape (c.1925), as her white-crested waves seem to roll towards you, about to crash out of the canvas and soak the gallery’s parquet flooring.
The majority of the works on display are from National Museums Liverpool’s own collection, which was predominantly built up during the 1870s-1920s, so it is unsurprising that there are major gaps in representation. In an effort to redress the balance, the exhibition includes Ingrid Pollard’s 1987 photographic series Pastoral Interlude, on loan from the Victoria and Albert Museum, which invites viewers to question their own assumptions about who belongs in the rural landscape when it is often the experience of Black or Asian people walking in the British countryside to be viewed as if they should not be there. (Due to copyright, I’m unable to include any Ingrid Pollard’s images, but you can see them on her website.)
“She explores the idea that the landscape is not separate from those issues of racism and colonialism,” says Jessie. “I thought it was really important to include that because the collection at National Museums Liverpool doesn’t cover that part of the history of landscape.”
NML is making an effort to address the gaps in its collection, adds Melissa: “We have a curator currently working on an exhibition about Black British women and non binary artists from the 1970s to the present, which is opening in October.
“We are actively trying to address the fact that the collection historically has been white, heterosexual, middle to upper middle class, and not reflective of Liverpool or people making art nationally and internationally. We are slowly trying to rectify that by working with global majority ethnic artists, asking them to engage and respond with the collections and then acquire that work.”
Another View: Landscapes by Women Artists opens at the Lady Lever Art Gallery tomorrow and runs until August 18. Entry is free, with donations welcome.
On the bookshelf
I regularly find myself wanting to discover more about subjects that I have read or written about. On the assumption that at least some of you share my natural curiosity, from now on, when relevant, I will include some suggestions of books that delve deeper into the subjects covered in Stored Honey.
Unquiet Landscape by Christopher Neve
Based on conversations between the author and a range of 20th century artists, Unquiet Landscape offers a connection between landscape art and the artists’ state of mind. Shelia Fell’s inescapable connection to the Cumbrian mining town where she was born is explored, as is Winifred Nicholson’s epiphany about colour, which has blown my mind ever since I read about it.
The Story of Art Without Men by Katy Hessell
Art historian Katy Hessel’s bestseller uses more than 300 works of art to tell the story of women’s part in artistic movements from the Renaissance to the present day. Her chatty writing style makes the book an entertaining and informative read - a good one for dipping into when you have a 10 minutes spare as well as for reading from cover to cover.
All book links are affiliates connected to Stored Honey’s bookshop.org page. Should you decide to buy from them, I will receive a small commission.
We’re Also Buzzing About…
If Walls Could Talk: Wirral-based artist Daniel Meakin will be launching his solo exhibition at Start-Yard, Birkenhead, with a live painting performance on the evening of April 26. Book a free ticket here. The show runs until May 29. More details on his Facebook.
Preston Caribbean Carnival: The town’s longest running cultural celebration, apart from its famous Guild, returns on May 26. Founded in 1974 by Prestonians with origins in St Vincent and the Grenadines, Dominica and other Caribbean islands, it draws tens of thousands of visitors. Few details have been released about this year’s event but you can sign up for updates.
¡Ole! Flamenco: Middle East-born artist Rina Srabonian’s stunning images captured at the Festival de la Bulería de Jerez show the strength and passion renowned contemporary and traditional flamenco dancers. It’s at Instituto Cervantes in Manchester until May 15.
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Have a great week,
Laura
