The Annual Watts Lecture
Dr Nicholas Penny
The Watts Lecture is sponsored by Dreweatts and Bloomsbury Auctions.
UPDATE - The Sixth Annual Watts Lecture
Dr Nicholas Penny: THE SUBJECT
Wednesday 23 February 2011, 6:30pm
Hall, Charterhouse, Godalming
Coming Soon
Photograph by Johnny Ring
The Watts Lecture 2010
Sir Andrew Motion: The Cinder Path
Sir Andrew Motion, former Poet Laureate, considered a number of G. F. Watts’s paintings and their relationship to poetry. He also introduced his latest book of poems, The Cinder Path and a new collection of essays, Ways of Life: On Places, Painters and Poets. He talked about his acclaimed autobiography In The Blood - A Memoir of My Childhood and answered questions about his writing and his role as Laureate.
‘Compelling, simple & mysterious’
Sean O’Brien, Sunday Times
Andrew Motion was appointed Poet Laureate in 1999. ‘I see myself as town crier, can-opener and flag-waver for poetry’. His poetry has received the Arvon/Observer Prize, the John Llewelyn Rhys Prize and the Dylan Thomas Prize. He is Professor of Creative Writing at Royal Holloway and recently co-founded The Poetry Archive. He was knighted in 2009.
‘His voice is unlike any other’
Lavinia Greenlaw, New Statesman & Society
The Watts Lecture 2009
Egotism and Altruism:
Watts and the Tate
Alison Smith, Head of British Art to 1900, Tate Britain
G. F. Watts was the only artist to donate works to the Tate Gallery when it was established in 1897. At the time this was widely perceived to be an altruistic gesture in that his pictures were seen to offer moral and spiritual consolation as well as enhancing the reputation of the British school. However, from around the time of the Second World War many of the works included in the bequest disappeared into the gallery’s stores never to re-emerge, testimony to changes in value which made Watts’s gift appear redundant. This lecture looks at the Watts bequest in relation to other art legacies, and examines the problem it presented in terms of the conditions it imposed, the on-going relationship between the Tate and the Watts estate, as well as shifts in taste and reputation.
Alison Smith is Head of British Art to 1900 at Tate Britain and author of The Victorian Nude: Sexuality, Morality and Art, MUP 1996, contributed to Representations of G. F. Watts, Ashgate 2004, and co-wrote the catalogue for the hugely popular show Millais, at Tate Britain in 2007.
‘Alison Smith is a brilliant speaker
who is passionate about Watts and Victorian art and I thoroughly recommend attending.’
Mark Bills, Curator
Watts and the Tate
Mark Bills introduces the Watts Lecture 2009
Alison Smith, one of the foremost of Victorian scholars and curators, is a leading curator at Tate. Her exhibitions of The Victorian Nude and Millais celebrate and explore Victorian art, bringing it to a new audience. Her lecture Egotism and Altruism: Watts and the Tate will discuss the long association of George Frederic Watts and the National Gallery of British Art. When the Tate was established in 1897, Watts was at the height of his fame and one of the most important figures in British art. His donation of works for the spiritual life of the nation there offered the artist a national platform as a modern-day prophet with works he felt were “for all time” with a language that was too didactic which made “people think.”
His gift was displayed in two small galleries until 1901 when it was moved into one large gallery. As Alison Smith has argued the Watts rooms helped to define the development of the modern museum: “As a neutral, non-sectarian location, the Watts room at the Tate (as opposed to the commercial space of the exhibition hall or dealer’s gallery), offered a pure, free arena for contemplation and cultural regeneration, anticipating one of the major functions of the modern art museum.”
In 1938, after the death of Mary the Watts room was dismantled and works put into store. Only more recently has the Tate shown Watts in the exhibition The Age of Rossetti, Burne-Jones & Watts: Symbolism in Britain, 1860–1910, in 1997 and in Alison Smith’s displays at Tate Britain.
Alison Smith is a brilliant speaker who is passionate about Watts and Victorian art and I thoroughly recommended attending. Her lecture looks at the Watts bequest in relation to other art legacies, and examines the problem it presented in terms of the conditions it imposed, the on-going relationship between the Tate and the Watts estate, as well as shifts in taste and reputation.
The Watts Lecture 2008
Watts and Death
A. N. Wilson
Charterhouse, Godalming
Sponsored by the Art Department, Charterhouse
In his lecture Wilson described G. F. Watts as being "scandalously under-rated" and gave a fascinating insight into his use of the death in both his paintings and sculpture.
We have signed copies of books by A. N. Wilson in the shop. Please call the Gallery to buy copies. 01483 810235 marketing@wattsgallery.org.uk
"Wilson’s book 'The Victorians' was the book he was born to write; it was evidently the product of decades of love for and familiarity with the period"
Philip Hensher Spectator
A. N. Wilson was born in 1950 and educated at Rugby and New College, Oxford. A fellow of the Royal Society of Literature, he has held a prominent position in the world of literature and journalism. He is an award winning biographer and a celebrated novelist, winning prizes for much of his fiction. He lives in North London.
The Watts Lecture 2007
Watts and the Hall of Fame Portraits
Sandy Nairne, Director of the National Portrait Gallery
Sandy Nairne was previously Director of Programmes at Tate and spent eight years working alngside Nicholas Serota in the building of Tate Modern and the Centenary Development at Tate Britain. He has worked as a curator and writer and is well known for his television series and book State of the Art (1987), and co-edited anthology Thinking About Exhibitions (1996).
The Watts Lecture 2006
Dr Tristram Hunt
Watts – The Catalyst of Social Reform
Dr Tristram Hunt is an expert in Victorian urban history and is currently a visiting professor at Arizona State University and a lecturer in history at Queen Mary, University of London. Educated at Trinity College, Cambridge and the University of Chicago, he was previously an associate fellow at the Centre for History and Economics, King’s College, Cambridge and research fellow at the Institute for Public Policy Research (IPPR). He is also author of numerous books and articles, the most recent being the critically acclaimed Building Jerusalem: The Rise and Fall of the Victorian City charting the history and architecture of the 19th Century city. In addition, he has worked extensively to generate a broader public interest in heritage through his articles in The Times, The Observer, The New Statesman and specialist journals. He has written and presented a number of radio and TV series including Civil War (BBC2), Isaac Newton: Great Briton (BBC2) and Past Presence (Radio 4) and is currently working on a new project for Channel 4.