Chester City Council

 

Grosvenor Museum Art Gallery

 

From The National Gallery to The Grosvenor Museum

‘Mares and foals beneath large oak trees’, a masterpiece by George Stubbs recently exhibited at London’s National Gallery, is coming to Chester’s Grosvenor Museum this summer.  It is one of three important paintings to be lent to the museum by His Grace the Duke of Westminster.  They will be displayed in the Art Gallery, alongside the museum’s own collection of British and Continental art, between Wednesday 30 July and Sunday 2 November.    

These paintings form part of a programme of loans to the museum from the Duke of Westminster.  Mostly acquired by the 1st and 2nd Earls Grosvenor in the late 18th and early 19th centuries, the Duke of Westminster’s paintings form one of the greatest aristocratic collections in Britain today.  Peter Boughton, the Museum’s Keeper of Art, said, “We are deeply grateful to His Grace for the loan of these beautiful paintings, which will enable them to be seen and enjoyed by our many visitors.” 

George Stubbs (1724-1806) was the greatest of all British horse painters.  His ‘Mares and foals beneath large oak trees’ was commissioned in 1764 by the 1st Baron Grosvenor, later 1st Earl Grosvenor, one of Stubbs’s most important patrons.  Stubbs’s horses, based on his profound knowledge of equine anatomy, have a nobility and sensitivity unsurpassed in the history of art.  Lord Grosvenor owned a stud-farm from 1754 until his death in 1802, with a total of 306 stallions and brood mares, earning him a reputation as ‘the greatest breeder of racing stock of any gentleman in England’.  He is said to have spent over £300,000 on his stud-farm, and incurred substantial gambling losses, but he also won the Derby three times and the Oaks five times.  

Claude Gellée (1600-1682), known in England as Claude Lorraine, worked in Rome and became the most famous and influential painter of idealised landscapes.  ‘The Rest on the Flight into Egypt’, painted around 1631-35, shows the Holy Family seated in a landscape.  Warned in a dream that King Herod was searching for the infant Jesus to kill him, Joseph took him and his mother Mary away to safety in Egypt, where they remained until Herod’s death.  Claude’s subjects were often taken from the Bible or Classical myth, but the small figures are absorbed into an enchanted pastoral landscape, rendered with extraordinary sensitivity to effects of light. 
 
Abraham van Diepenbeeck (1596-1675) was a glass-painter, draughtsman, painter and tapestry designer in Antwerp.  Strongly influenced by Rubens, ‘The Conversion of St Paul’ relates to van Diepenbeeck’s series of oil sketches, painted around 1630-36, for windows depicting episodes from the life of St Paul for the Dominican church in Antwerp.  Saul (as he was known before his conversion) was travelling to Damascus to persecute Christians.  On the road he was struck to the ground, blinded by a sudden light from heaven.  The voice of Jesus said, ‘Saul, Saul, why do you persecute me?’  He is shown lying on the ground beneath his rearing horse, overcome before the appearance of Christ.  In Damascus his sight was restored and he was baptised into the Church, becoming one of the greatest saints. 

The Art Gallery was opened in 1989 by Sir Timothy Clifford, Director-General of the National Galleries of Scotland. Most of the Museum's finest paintings are shown here, hung two deep against gold moire and enhanced by sculpture and furniture.

Although many of our portraits are shown elsewhere in the Museum, some of the best are in the Art Gallery. A remarkable triple portrait of Mary Done, painted around 1635-38 by John Dobson, shows her contemplating her own bust, which has closed eyes like a death mask. Her son  Sir John Crewe, Chief Forester of Delamere, was painted in 1682 by John Michael Wright, one of the most cosmopolitan figures in 17th century British art. A subsequent Chief Forester of Delamere, John Arderne, was painted about 1746 by Arthur Devis in his characteristically neat and genteel style.

Sculpture plays a prominent role in the gallery, and includes a low-relief plaster medallion of about 1852 by the Pre-Raphaelite sculptor Alexander Munro depicting Constance, Countess Grosvenor, later Duchess of Westminster. In 1879 her brother, Lord Ronald Gower, made a bronze statuette of the Prime Minister, William Ewart Gladstone, who lived at Hawarden Castle near Chester. The collection extends into the 20th century with two pairs of Wedgwood basaltes ware vases, originally made for Winnington Hall at Northwich in 1921, and a brilliant likeness of Canon Maurice Ridgway, the great expert on Chester silver, painted by Paul Brason in 1994.

Chester is England's most picturesque city, enclosing two thousand years of history within the two-mile circuit of her walls. She has inspired artists for more than four centuries, and the Museum houses over seven hundred pictures of the city. A painting of Chester by the Flemish artist Pieter Tillemans, dating between 1710 and 1734, shows horseracing on the Roodee in front of the City Walls. A mid-19th century view shows the Cathedral before the major restoration in 1868-76, when much of its soft red sandstone exterior was refaced. Another mid-19th century painting by W. White shows the King Charles Tower, on which Charles I stood in 1645 while his army was being defeated by the Parliamentarians at Rowton Moor.

As well as pictures of Chester, the Museum houses scenes of Cheshire and North Wales, including a view of Chirk Castle, painted by Felix Kelly about 1955. A painting by the Irish artist George Barret Senior, dating from about 1770, shows the dramatic, ivy-clad ruin of Beeston Castle.

In addition to paintings of local people and places, the gallery shows the work of local artists, such as a view of Gordale Scar, painted in 1772 by Samuel Stringer of Knutsford. A view of Thirlmere, painted in the early 1790s by the Cheshire-born artist John Rathbone, has figures by the better-known George Morland, with whom he frequently collaborated.

Furniture makes a notable contribution to the gallery, and includes a card table, veneered with rosewood and inlaid with brass, which is signed and dated 1824 by the Chester cabinetmaker John Crewe McKay. Chester's greatest sporting artist was William Tasker, noted for his portraits of winners at the Chester races, and the gallery includes his painting of Millipede from 1843.

As well as local artists and subjects, the history of art collecting in Chester is represented in the gallery, with works such as Feeding the Ducks, a highly-finished painting of the mid-19th century by John Frederick Herring Senior, which came from Hoole Hall.

The history of collecting in Chester has also brought to the gallery a small group of paintings by artists from mainland Europe. Among them is the Virgin and Child with the Infant Baptist, probably painted by Johann Konig in the German city of Augsburg about 1616, which shows the Christ Child accepting his future death on the Cross. Also dating from the 17th century is Diana the Huntress, painted in Bruges by Jacob van Oost the Elder. This richly decorative painting, showing the Classical goddess of the moon, provides a splendid centrepiece to the gallery.

For further information on the following works of art please click on these links

Chester and the Roodee by Pieter Tillemans

Chester Exchange by David Hodgson

Constance, Countess Grosvenor by Alexander Munro

Diana the Huntress by Jacob van Oost the Elder

Henbury Hall by Carl Laubin

Canon Maurice Ridgway by Paul Brason

Sheep by a Mountain Stream by William Huggins

Statuette of W.E. Gladstone by Lord Ronald Gower

The Old Dee Bridge attributed to Edmund Garvey

Triple Portrait of Mary Done by William Dobson

Virgin and Child attributed to Johann König 

Christ Blessing - Studio of Quinten Metsys