Framed - Art Treasures of Peterborough Museum

The exhibition includes works by traditional masters such as JMW Turner, Nathan Fielding and Walter Sickert and modern artists including Patrick Heron and Elizabeth Frink. It brings together rarely seen art work which until now has been kept under wraps in the museum's back collections. Also on display will be a new addition to the Museum's collections, a work by Thomas Worlidge, the renowned 18^th century engraver who was born in Peterborough. This engraving has been kindly donated by the Friends of Peterborough Museum & Art Gallery.

 

Visitors are also able to chart Peterborough's development from a modest market town to a bustling modern city through local views and landscapes covering the last 300 years. As part of the exhibition the clock has been turned back and part of the exhibition will include a recreation of the wonderful look and feel of the original Maxwell Art Gallery when it first opened to the public in 1952, thanks to a bequest from Anne Maxwell Davis in 1939. The building work was postponed due to the outbreak of war and with only a roof and water-tight walls in place the gallery became a food storage facility for Peterborough citizens until the end ofhostilities. Construction resumed post-war and the first exhibition was called Art Treasures with works loaned from the private collections of local estates.

Two of the rarely seen works from the Museum's collections include two little-known watercolours by the great British artist JMW Turner. Famed for his seascapes these two works are views of Peterborough Cathedral painted on a visit to the city in 1795.  Just like the gallery many of the pictures in the new exhibition also have fascinating stories attached to them.  The wedding portraits of Thomas and Caroline Welch-Hunt, dating from 1824, convey a bitter-sweet tale of love and loss.  The wealthy young couple from Northamptonshire had embarked on a grand tour of Europe for their honeymoon, which was cut tragically short when they were shot and killed by bandits in Italy. 

 

The art gallery at the Museum was until recently the home to the Space4 gallery for new media and digital art, this cutting-edge programme will continue from a new venue within the Key Theatre. This exhibition marks the re-launch of the gallery and a new direction for its programmes and vision for the future.  As such, the Museum is inviting visitors and residents to take part in an on-going consultation regarding future exhibitions in the gallery.  If you would like to be involved please e-mail: museum@peterborough.gov.uk, or speak to a member of staff during your visit.

 

Councillor Matthew Lee, cabinet member for community services, said: "Seeing this outstanding collection of artwork showcased together for the first time in such a peaceful and authentic setting really brings home the fact that Peterborough has a lot to be proud of as a cultural and artistic city. Even going back hundreds of years, internationally renowned artists such as JMW Turner were inspired to paint here." 

 

Gillian Barclay, Peterborough City Council's heritage services manager, said: "This exhibition is a long awaited opportunity for us to showcase the art collection. There are some surprising and fascinating pieces, works that are both artistically important in their own right but also present a very special glimpse into Peterborough's people and past through the artists' eye."