A History of Brighton in One Painting

In January 2012, we all held our breath during a nail-biting auction at Christies in New York. Under the hammer was a unique watercolour, Brighthelmstone, Sussex painted by JMW Turner in c1824. At the centre of Turner’s image stands the Royal Pavilion.

Joseph Mallord William Turner R.A. The Chain Pier Brighton c1824

The painting had been in private hands and unseen by the public for more than 100 years. Now, here was the chance to save this highly significant part of our heritage for public collection and display, and to head off the risk that it went out of public view again and into a private collection, possibly overseas. But we had to move fast.  The Heritage Lottery Fund and the Art Fund both fast tracked our applications and offered funding just days before the auction. Topped up with a gift by a generous patron of the Royal Pavilion & Museums Foundation, we were ready to bid.

Watching the Turner auction

After tense auction room exchanges, watched via a video link–up live in the office, the hammer finally went down, and the painting was Brighton’s.  This is a very significant acquisition for the Royal Pavilion & Museums, and the city of Brighton & Hove. The painting, by one of Britain’s most famous artists, captures all the characteristics of Brighton in a single, wonderfully detailed view.  Depicting the town from the sea, the composition emphasises what was new in Brighton and wonderfully captures the bustle and excitement of the town. Turner has placed the Royal Pavilion in the centre of the picture, thus emphasizing the contribution George IV made, when Prince of Wales, to the establishment of Brighton as a pleasure resort. It is particularly fascinating to note that the north-south axis of the building has been adjusted so that the Pavilion seems to be parallel with the seafront, thus allowing the building to dominate the centre of the composition. The right hand side of the image is devoted to the recently built Chain Pier, a bold statement of technology and engineering and the country’s first pleasure pier. Beside this modern wonder, Turner depicts traditional Brighton fishing boats, juxtaposing the old and the new. The picture encapsulates the fishing town, the fashionable resort, and the bathing spa. It is regarded as THE defining image of Brighton in the 1800s.

Winning the Turner at auction

The watercolour went on display in Brighton Museum & Art Gallery over the summer, shortly after its arrival from New York.  Given the sensitivity of watercolours to light, its display has to be limited to ensure its long term preservation. The painting is now in store whilst we work on plans for a landmark Turner exhibition in the Royal Pavilion from November 2013-February 2014. ‘Turner in Brighton’ will showcase this iconic image, contextualised by loans from national galleries such as Tate and the V&A, and private collectors.

Requests to view the painting in store should be made to: Jenny Lund, Curator of Fine Art, The Royal Pavilion & Museums, 4-5 Pavilion Buildings, Brighton BN1 1EE. Email: jenny.lund@brighton-hove.gov.uk. Phone: 01273 292285.

Laura Williams, Development Manager

Telling the stories of the artefacts, Pick a Painting – Any Painting….

During July-August 2012 Creative Future ran a course at Brighton Museum called ‘Museum Tales’. Run by Liz Bahs, a published poet, course participants, all marginalized writers, produced the following pieces inspired by the Museum’s collection. At the end of the course they performed their work in the Museum galleries. The course will run again in January 2013. For more information check their website.

Museum Tales performance

Pick a Painting – Any Painting….

I slip into the gallery upstairs and lose my footing straight away:

drowning in a pool of paintings on display – all

clamouring for attention – I’m out of my depth.

My head barely clears the engulfing waves of pigment

and composition that lay claim to be admired:

I’m lost for choice, with no ground to stand on.

I don’t want the lady in the bed, just beside the door,

looking provocatively up at whoever’s looking back,

patting the empty space beside her. Too much a mirror.

Nor, Gertler’s Dutch Doll – an artist’s model – with no

distinguishing features of its own – to be manhandled

amidst colourful miscellany: that’s too close to home.

Daunted by paintings at every turn and corner,

I head for the relative haven of Ivon Hitchen’s Forest,

but am assaulted by a daub of yellow taking a flying leap

across the canvas: a paparazzi of paint – a flash of alarm.

I oscillate between waves and vibrations that push my limit

of endurance. I’m gasping for peace and stability.

When did Art get so predatory? And precarious?

I clutch at the straw of Nash’s Granary; the grace of

understatement; the quiet respite of muted tones.

That simple wooden staircase I can grasp, and hold to.

To rise above turbulence and gain a higher view.

I head out of bedlam – one wooden step at a time.

Janina Aza Karpinska

Etchings of Frank Brangwyn

Factory scene lithograph

Sir Frank Brangwyn (1867-1956) was, in the early 1900s, one of the most revered artists in the world. Today he is little-known and is more likely to be associated with the eponymous concert hall in Swansea than with the murals which decorate its walls. As late as 1952 he was important enough to be the subject of the first retrospective at the Royal Academy of a living artist. Now, over 50 years after his death, he is due for a reappraisal.

Born in Bruges of Welsh parents, Brangwyn received no formal training, though as a young man he worked with William Morris and was thoroughly imbued with the principles of the Arts and Crafts Movement. As a painter he had a passion for the sea and his early work was influenced by the realists Bastien-Lepage and H H La Thangue. The Scots colourist Arthur Melville taught him to brighten his palette and he was much struck with Delacroix’s lively handling of paint. Other major influences were Whistler, 16th century Venetian art, French symbolism and William Morris and the pre-Raphaelites. From the 1890s onwards he won medals for painting at international exhibitions and in 1895 Siegfried Bing asked him to decorate the façade of the famous Paris shop L’Art Nouveau in a style evoking Japanese woodcuts. At this time Brangwyn was designing carpets and decorative schemes which placed him in the forefront of the avant garde.

Printmaker 

‘Man with a Bow Saw’ lithograph, FA208396

Brangwyn achieved early fame as a printmaker and in his lifetime designed over 1,000 original prints. He was excited by the prospects offered by printmaking to make art affordable to a broader audience. His work is characterised by an intense sympathy for the terrible and daily labour of humanity.

Other themes that emerge include

• a fascination with ships and the sea, especially the dismantling of the monumental warships that were once the pride of the British Navy
• figure groups caught up in the fury of modern life
• building yards, odd corners of old cities, especially London and Venice
• sheds, factories and foundries and smoking, writhing, living matter

Many of Brangwyn’s etchings are of great size. As one commentator wrote ‘the artist doesn’t beguile or charm; he dominates’.

The Collection

‘Man rolling a Barrel (A cooper at work)’ lithograph, FA208398

In the 1930s and 1940s Brangwyn’s somewhat bombastic style began to seem old fashioned. He paid little regard to contemporary developments and in his later years he lived as a virtual recluse in Ditchling, where he had settled in 1918.

During the 1930s Brangwyn gave away many of his pictures and prints. In 1935 Brighton Museum received no fewer than 147 etchings and 48 lithographs. The gift was in recognition of the kindness shown by the director, Henry Roberts, in allowing Brangwyn the use of the exhibition galleries in 1933 to paint the large murals he was preparing for the Radio Corporation of America Building (now the General Electric Building) in the Rockefeller Centre, New York. Brangwyn never went to the USA and never saw the murals in situ.

Brangwyn’s Posters

‘Use Your Public Library’ lithograph, FA208391

‘Peace Issued to the World by the Daily Herald’ c1918, FA208388

‘Pollards Storefitters’ c1930, lithograph FA208392

Brangwyn produced over 40 posters for commercial enterprises between 1899 and 1936. He wanted to ‘see more art used in advertising, because advertising is a tremendous force which needs handling with much more art and common sense than it is getting at present.’

In 1930 E Pollard and Company organised an exhibition of furniture and other articles designed by Frank Brangwyn. The exhibition extended to four rooms of Pollard’s premises.