Leeds Gallery Cow Pictures, Top 5!

During my internship at Leeds Art Gallery, I have been taking archival photographs of the collection of watercolours, drawings and prints that are stored in the many cupboards of the print room. It’s an enjoyable experience, as each day I get to study Gainsboroughs, Constables, Rembrandts, and, on a rare find, Blakes. The range of subject matter in the pictures is quite fascinating, but what I have noticed in particular is an abundance of paintings and drawings that include representations of cows! Maybe the images of these peaceful animals caught my attention because fields full of cattle is a vista that is generally lacking in city centres. So, in an attempt to bring cows into the city, I have compiled a top 5 chart of my favourite cow pictures that I have seen so far in the Leeds collection!


5th place:
Alfred Edward Chalon, 1780-1860
Pastoral Evening



A pen, ink and watercolour drawing of a herd of cows being driven home and descending a hill as the sun sets. This picture was most likely a quick sketch or preparatory drawing, as it lacks the highly detailed finish that the Swiss born Chalon’s paintings tend to display. But this is why I like it. The legs of the roughly drawn cows look quite awkward, as if they are struggling to walk down the hill after a long day in the fields.


4th place:
Edward Dayes, 1763-1804



A stream, a bridge, a town in the background, a family, and some cows: this picture is an example of the delicate style of the skilled figure painter Edward Dayes. The intermingling of urban and rural imagery in this picture shows cows to be an inevitable part of the landscape in the 18th century in both town and countryside. The cows paddle in the stream as one stares at its own reflection in the water.


3rd place:
William Chapman, 1817-1879
A View of York



Here again, cows can be seen as an intrinsic feature of the urban/rural landscape. Chapman uses a rich pinky-red as the sun descends over York, and the cows huddle together in the foreground by a broken fence. A love of the strawberry roan colour of cows contributed to the desire of artists such as Chapman and David Cox to frequently depict these animals in their works.


2nd place:
William Estall, 1857-1897



Estall uses bright colours and expressive brush-strokes in this picture of a wooded scene with houses in the background, a stream, a paddling of ducks and two cows. This painting is one of my favourites as I feel the cows are not just simply part of the scenery, but have been imbued with personality! The cows stand by the river, looking at each other, as if deep in conversation or perhaps in the middle of a staring competition..


1st place:
George Chinnery, 1774-1852



My top cow picture is this work by George Chinnery. This was the first picture at the gallery that I fell in love with, and that ultimately inspired the top 5! Here, the cows go for a day at the beach, some paddle whilst others choose to sunbathe. The atmosphere is serene, and Chinnery’s use of light and shade plays homage to his skill as a watercolour artist.

So, cattle have proved to be popular subject matter for 18th and 19th Century watercolour artists and were, and indeed still are, common and beautiful features of the Great British landscape. The inclusion of these animals in paintings and drawings seems to automatically add a sense of serenity and an uplifting mood to the work perhaps by conjuring for the viewer the slow pace of life that cows enjoy!

Indeed, this view of cows as peaceful, uplifting animals, is one shared by the organisers of CowParade: the world’s largest public art event. CowParade has raised millions for charities and donated to artist communities over the years by staging events in over 50 cities worldwide. Life-size fiberglass cows created by artists, designers, architects and each sporting different patterns, designs and themes, are dotted around the city for all to see and touch.

CowParade’s reasoning behind using models of cattle specifically, includes the fact that the cow is an animal that receives ‘universal affection, representing different things to different people around the world’ from being a sacred or historical animal, to being a purely familiar and beloved creature. CowParade has visited cities all over the world including Florence, Johannesburg, London and Manchester, but it has yet to come to Leeds.

If you want to learn more about CowParade, follow this link to their website:

http://cowparade.com/

I hope you have enjoyed my top 5 and that it has showcased a handful of the beautiful watercolours and drawings that make up the Leeds collection.

What Goes Down Must Go Up

On Friday, the Hinton House bed restoration project began to get moving..literally.
The bed was dismantled piece by piece and is now ready for the necessary structural and conservation works.
Technicians rested the canopy on two small forklifts called genies.

Then the rest of the bed was removed from under the canopy starting with the headboard.

The canopy was raised slightly, lifting it off the bed posts.The posts were removed one at a time and carefully wrapped up for storage and study. It turns out that the whole canopy was fixed by very small spikes on the top of each post. It made me wonder how on earth the canopy didn't fall down. I'll admit that seeing the posts being removed from the canopy leaving it resting on the lift.


The canopy was then slowly lowered then lifted onto a work surface ready for work to begin.



Now the canopy is at eye level it is possible to see what a mess it is in. The cornices are degraded and the structure is about to collapse in on itself.

For the first time I have been able see properly the holes and parts which tell us that the bed canopy was meant to be up in the air and flying. I suppose it is possible to draw analogies with a phoenix, that dies and burns up every 500 years to rise again anew. The Hinton House bed has been collapsed 300 years after it was made. Over the next year, the canopy will be lifted again, refreshed and renewed.

Giggleswick Tarn Logboat

Today I have been writing new labels for some of the large archaeological items in our store at Leeds Museum Discovery Centre. One of the objects I looked at is a Medieval logboat from Giggleswick Tarn, North Yorkshire, which has a really interesting story to tell.

On May 25th 1863 Mr. Joseph Taylor came across a dug-out canoe while carrying out drainage works on the site of the former Giggleswick Tarn. He thought it to be ‘evidently of Celtic or British workmanship’. The landowner, Mr. William Hartley, promptly donated the boat to Leeds Museum where it was put on display.

On the evening of 16th March 1941 Leeds Museum received a direct hit in one of the wartime bombing raids, devastating parts of the collection. The logboat was shattered into forty-five pieces. Each piece was carefully sifted from the debris, wrapped in sheets of the News Chronicle, and stored in a crate.

It wasn’t until 1974 that the fragments were re-examined with a view to reconstructing the vessel. The pieces were sent down to the National Maritime Museum at Greenwich to be researched, conserved and re-assembled.

As a result of the research done at Greenwich, we now know that the boat was made from a single ash tree and dates to around 1335 AD. It was designed to carry one person sitting on the D-shaped board, from which the boat could be propelled with a paddle. There was also some room for carrying cargo. It is likely that the boat was used to fish from the tarn.

The logboat returned to Leeds City Museum in 1988. It is currently housed in Leeds Museum Discovery Centre, and can be viewed by appointment.

Author: Katherine Baxter, Curator of Archaeology, Leeds Museums and Galleries

Puzzled

The Abbey House Wednesday Clubbers had fun this week piecing together jigsaws that had probably not been out of their box for over 80 years. This helped the museum to catalogue the puzzles properly, check if they were complete and also in many instances actually see the picture for the first time. Some of the jigsaws had been issued by newspapers (such as the Daily Mail and Evening Standard) in the 1930s and offered prizes of £5000 to those who could complete them. Fortunately this incentive was not needed and all the jigsaws were finished by the early afternoon.

The "Popular Dogs" jigsaw proved particularly challenging as the pieces are not fully interlocking and had a tendancy to move out of place and was the only puzzle to defeat the patience of the Wednesday Club ladies. It was completed by following day by Toni Giles, an intern student at the museum.