Robin Simon is giving the Paul Mellon Lectures for 2013, National Gallery, London, every Monday at 6.30 pm, Monday 14 January until Monday 11 February.
The theme is British art and the theatre, with the title 'Painters and Players from Hogarth to Olivier'.
Details on the National Gallery website
The lecture series will be repeated at the Yale Center for British Art, New Haven, over a two-week period 10-24 April 2013. Details to follow.
Robin Simon will be joined by actor William Chubb for the first three lectures in London, and for the final lecture by soprano Alison Pearce and Paul Wynne-Griffiths, piano. The music will include works by Handel, Arne and Linley

Motya Charioteer

Motya Charioteer at the British Museum
I have a question. Where's willy? Think about it. More to follow…

Terry Friedman is Berger Prize Winner 2012

Terry Friedman is the winner of the £5000 William MB Berger Prize for British Art History 2012 for his book The Eighteenth Century Church in Britain published for the Paul Mellon Centre by Yale University Press. 


The prize was presented by Sir Timothy Clifford at a reception held at the Paul Mellon Centre for Studies in British Art in London on the evening of Thursday 5 July. The book was, in the opinion of the assessors, ‘quite simply definitive’. It seemed incredible, several thought, that ‘one man could do it’. It was ‘a revelation of the sheer variety of architecture involved’, all organized ‘with the utmost care and lucidity’. It seems to be, they said, ‘an exhaustive treatment’ of a very understudied but major subject, and yet it ‘opens up entirely new fields for further research and discussion’.


Sir Timothy quoted the assessors' remarks about the other books on the Short List of six:

John Zoffany RA: Society Observed edited by Martin Postle, was the catalogue of the exhibition of the same name, at Yale and the Royal Academy, published by the Yale Center for British Art, New Haven, and the Royal Academy of Arts, in association with Yale University Press. It was, in the assessors’ opinion, ‘fantastic, wonderful, with an excellent cast of contributors’. ‘Exciting’, with ‘lots of new material’, obviously at ‘the cutting edge of research’, and ‘beautifully produced’. It ‘shows the way forward for almost endless research into this underestimated artist’. ‘This is the Zoffany who captures the imagination’.

The English Castle by John Goodall, published for the Paul Mellon Centre by Yale University Press, was, the assessors said, an instance of ‘an individual scholar taking an enormous subject and making it both clear and exciting’. ‘The extraordinary clarity of the exposition was brilliantly complemented by splendid photographs and invaluable diagrams of all kinds’. ‘The captions alone are brilliant’ while ‘the text with its many technical terms is not only easy to read but a great pleasure’. It was, they thought, ‘definitive’.

Inigo Jones: The Architect of Kings by Vaughan Hart, published for the Paul Mellon Centre by Yale University Press, was ‘a model for a monograph on any architect’, a ‘focused effort at providing both a national and international context to Jones’s architecture’. The book was ‘full of stimulating ideas’, ‘fresh and exciting’, and ‘the author is at pains to confront several contentious issues – and he does so with vigour’, and puts forward ‘any number of ingenious and original interpretations’.

Johan Zoffany: 1733-1810 by Mary Webster was also published for the Paul Mellon Centre for Studies in British Art by Yale University Press. This was ‘truly the achievement of a lifetime’, a book that has been some forty years in the making, and it was ‘well worth the wait’. It was, the assessors felt, not only ‘extremely successful as a biography’ but also ‘hugely enjoyable’ with its subject ‘emerging from the shadows in all his eccentricity and brilliance’. The ‘excellent illustrations’ were considered by several of the judges almost as valuable as the ‘mass of historical material so very well marshalled and presented’. ‘A great book’.

Royal Manuscripts: The Genius of Illumination by Scot Mckendrick, John Lowden & Kathleen Doyle, published by British Library Publishing, accompanied the magnificent exhibition of the same name. It was, said the assessors, ‘exactly the kind of exhibition that the British Library ought to put on, and the book amply complemented an extraordinary show’. The illustrations are ‘stunningly’, ‘jaw-droppingly’ beautiful. ‘If anything it left one wishing for more’.

Sir Timothy reported that the assessors wished especially to note the outstanding nature of a few of the many titles which can be seen on the Long List, notably the pioneering study by Gwen Yarker of portraiture in Dorset, Georgian Faces – Portrait of a County; the book (in Dutch) of the Stanley Spencer exhibition in Rotterdam by Alied Ottevanger; and the catalogue raisonné of William Nicholson by Patricia Reed, Wendy Baron and Merlin James.

The assessors were: Timothy J. Standring, Gates Foundation Curator of Painting & Sculpture, Denver Art Museum; Robin Simon, Editor, The British Art Journal; Rosemary Hill, sometime Fellow, All Souls’ College, Oxford, and independent scholar; Katherine Eustace, Editor of the Sculpture journal; Desmond Shawe-Taylor, Surveyor of The Queen’s Pictures; Angus Trumble, Senior Curator of Paintings and Sculpture, Yale Center for British Art

Berger Prize 2012

The William MB Berger Prize for British Art History 2012
Short List (books published in 2011) (Long List below)

The Eighteenth Century Church in Britain

Terry Friedman

Published for the Paul Mellon Centre by Yale University Press

ISBN 978-0-300-15908-0, £60, pp 496, 520 bw, 185 col

The English Castle

John Goodall

Published for the Paul Mellon Centre by Yale University Press

ISBN 978-0-300-11058-6, £45, pp480, 100 bw, 250 col

Inigo Jones: The Architect of Kings

Vaughan Hart

Published for the Paul Mellon Centre by Yale University Press

ISBN 9780300141498, £35, pp336, 130 bw, 100 col

Royal Manuscripts:  The Genius of Illumination

Scot Mckendrick, John Lowden & Kathleen Doyle

British Library publishing

ISBN 9780712358156, £40, pp448, 300 col

John Zoffany RA Society Observed

Martin Postle, ed

Yale Center for British Art, New Haven, & Royal Academy of Arts, London, in association with Yale University Press, New Haven & London

ISBN 9781907533266, £40 hb, £24.95 pb, pp 320, 5 bw, 225 col

Johan Zoffany: 1733-1810

Mary Webster

Published for the Paul Mellon Centre for Studies for British Art by Yale University Press

ISBN 9780300162783, £40, pp416, 175 bw, 180 col

The award of the prize, worth £5000 to the winner, will be made at an evening  reception on 5 July 2012 at the Paul Mellon Centre for Studies in British Art, London. It will be presented by Sir Timothy Clifford. Past winners and details of the prize can be found at this link

The William MB Berger Prize for British Art History 2012

Long List (books published in 2011)

Georgian Faces. Portrait of a County

Gwen Yarker

Dorset County Museum

Dorset Natural History & Archaeological Society

ISBN 978-0-900341-05-2, pp111, 100+ col & bw

The Eighteenth Century Church in Britain
Terry Friedman
Published for the Paul Mellon Centre by Yale University Press
ISBN 978-0-300-15908-0, £60, pp 496, 520 bw, 185 col

Stanley Spencer Schilderkunst tussen hemel en aarde (Stanley Spencer Painting Between Heaven and Earth
Alied Ottevanger
WBOOKS www.wbooks.com
ISBN 978 90 891 0306 2, Euros 39,50, pp169, 100+ col

Roma Britannica. Art Patronage and Cultural Exchange in Eighteenth-century Rome
David R Marshall, Susan Russell, Karin Wolfe, eds
The British School at Rome, London
ISBN 978 0 904152 55 5, £35 (pb), pp374, 158 bw, 52 col

William Nicholson. A Catalogue Raisonné of the Oil Paintings

Patricia Reed, Wendy Baron, Merlin James

Yale University Press

ISBN 9780300170542, £95, pp672, 640 col, 90 bw

Rossetti: Painter and Poet

JB Bullen

Frances Lincoln Ltd

ISBN 978-0-7112-3225-9, £35 hb, pp272, 180 col & bw

Strawberry Hill

Anna Chalcraft & Judith Viscardi

Frances Lincoln Publishers

ISBN 9780711231849, £20 pb, pp160, 100 col

Imperial Landscapes: Britain’s Global Visual Culture 1745-1820

John E Crowley, author

Published for the Paul Mellon Centre by Yale University Press

ISBN 9780300170504, £45, pp320, 115 bw, 135 col

Art for the Nation: The Eastlakes & the Victorian Art World

Susanna Avery-Quash & Julie Sheldon

Yale University Press

ISBN 9781857095074, £27, pp 304, 14 bw, 28 col

The English Castle

John Goodall

Published for the Paul Mellon Centre by Yale University Press

ISBN 978-0-300-11058-6, £45, pp480, 100 bw, 250 col

Mysterious Wisdom: The Life & Work of Samuel Palmer

Rachel Campbell-Johnston

Bloomsbury Press

ISBN 978-0-7475-9587-8, £25 pp400, 15 col

The Cult of Beauty

Stephen Calloway & Lynn Federle Orr, eds

V&A Publishing

ISBN 9781851776283, £40, pp288, 250 col

Inigo Jones: The Architect of Kings

Vaughan Hart

Published for the Paul Mellon Centre by Yale University Press

ISBN 9780300141498, £35, pp336, 130 bw, 100 col

English Drawings & Watercolours 1600-1900

Christopher Baker, author

National Galleries of Scotland

ISBN 9781906270353, £125, pp464, 460 col

Public Sculpture of Bristol

Douglas Merritt & Francis Greenacre with Katherine Eustace

Liverpool University Press

ISBN 9781846316388, £30 pb, £60 hb, pp306, 350 bw

The New Painting of the 1860s

Allen Staley

Yale University Press

ISBN 9780300175677, £50, pp438, 150bw, 200 col

Turner and the Elements

Ortrud Westheider and Michael Philipp, eds

Hirmer Publishers

ISBN 3777440019, £39.95, pp256, 10 bw, 150 col

Empire To Nation: Art, History and the Visualization of Maritime Britain 1786-1829

Geoff Quilley

Published for the Paul Mellon Centre by Yale University Press

ISBN 9780300175684, £40, pp304, 100 bw, 40 col

John Constable: Oil Sketches from the V & A

Mark Evans

V&A Publishing

ISBN 9781851776269, £25, pp144, 120 col

Canterbury Cathedral Priory: In the age of Becket

Peter Fergusson, author

Published for the Paul Mellon Centre by Yale University Press

ISBN 978-0-300-175691, £50, pp288, 100 bw, 50 col

Royal Manuscripts:  The Genius of Illumination

Scot Mckendrick, John Lowden & Kathleen Doyle

British Library publishing

ISBN 9780712358156, £40, pp448, 300 col

John Zoffany RA Society Observed

Martin Postle, ed

Yale Center for British Art, New Haven, & Royal Academy of Arts, London, in association with Yale University Press, New Haven & London

ISBN 9781907533266, £40 hb, £24.95 pb, pp 320, 5 bw, 225 col

Writing The Lives of Painters: Biography & Artistic Identity in Britain 1760-1810

Karen Junod

Oxford University Press

ISBN 9780199597000, £63, pp 272, 25 bw

The Manchester Art Treasures Exhibition of 1857:

Entrepreneurs, Connoisseurs & the Public

Elizabeth A Pergam

Ashgate Publishing

ISBN 9781409418306, £70, pp396, 53 bw, 12 col

John Martin Apocalypse

Martin Myrone, ed

Tate Publishing

ISBN 978 1 85437 889 7, £30, pp240, 100+ col

An Artists’ Village: GF Watts & Mary Watts at Compton

Mark Bills

Philip Wilson Publishers

ISBN 9780856676963, £19.95, pp176, 100+ bw & col

Francis Bedford, Landscape Photography & Nineteenth Century British Culture

Stephanie Spencer

Ashgate publishing

ISBN 9781409408536, £60, pp212, ill bw

Watercolour

Alison Smith, ed

Tate publishing

ISBN 9781854379139, £24.99, pp192, 150 col

Stanley Spencer and the English Garden

Steven Parissien, ed

Paul Holberton Publishing

ISBN 9781907372124, £16.99, pp96, 50 col

John Piper in Kent & Sussex

Nathaniel Hepburn, ed

Mascalls Gallery

ISBN 978-0956767608, £20, pp 128, ill col

Johan Zoffany: 1733-1810

Mary Webster

Published for the Paul Mellon Centre for Studies for British Art by Yale University Press

ISBN 9780300162783, £40, pp416, 175 bw, 180 col

Constable and Salisbury: The Soul of Landscape

Timothy Wilcox

Scala Publishers

ISBN 978 1 85759 679 3, £25, pp196, 138 bw & col

Painting Canada: Tom Thomson and the Group of Seven

Ian Dejardin et al

Philip Wilson Publishers

ISBN 9780856677083, £45, pp216, 40 bw, 196 col

Lost and Found: Wright of Derby’s View of Gibraltar

John Bonehill, Janet M Brooke, David de Witt & Barbara Klempan

Agnes Etherington Art Centre

Queen’s University, Kingston, Ontario

ISBN 9781553392583, £38.99, pp 66, ills col

Court on Canvas: Tennis in Art

Ann Sumner, ed

Philip Wilson Publishers

ISBN 9780856677069 (pb), £20, pp176

Hope: The Life & Times of a Victorian Icon

Nicholas Tromans, author

Watts Gallery

ISBN 9780956102270, £10

Gainsborough’s Landscapes

Susan Sloman, author

Philip Wilson Publishers

ISBN 9780856676970, £14.99, pp 120

John Craxton

Ian Collins, author

Ashgate Publishing

ISBN 9781848220690, £35pp 186 bw 47 col179

Meetings in Marrakech

Vincenza Russo – Editorial Coordination

Skira Editore

ISBN 9788857212418, pp 76 ill 50

Call for papers AAH Conference 2012

Call for papers
AAH Annual Conference 2012
The Open University,
Milton Keynes 29-31 March 2012
‘Conflicting Art Histories: Dialogues of Cosmopolitanism and Nationalism in Eighteenth-Century British Culture’. Session Convenors: Freya Gowrley and Viccy Coltman, University of Edinburgh, f.l.gowrley@gmail.com, viccy.coltman@ed.ac.uk
William Hogarth’s traditional position as the stalwart of English nationalism in the arts was drastically re-evaluated in 2007 with the publication of Robin Simon’s Hogarth, France & British Art. Published to coincide with the Tate’s major Hogarth exhibition of 2007, Simon’s text situates Hogarth, a renowned anglophile, within a firmly European context of artistic theory and practice. How does the idea that Hogarth gleefully propagated his anti-Gallic public image, but was in fact greatly indebted to French art and theory, affect our understanding of apparently critical 18th-century works of art such as his Marriage A-la-Mode (1743-5)? While historians Linda Colley and Gerald Newman prioritised national identity as an evaluative tool for the examination of aspects of eighteenth-century British culture, is it appropriate to apply this label to broad cultural manifestations, notably the consumptive behavioural patterns of the
aristocracy and the middling classes alike? This session will consider this intriguing dichotomy of 18th-century British art – the underwritten and unresolved conflict between nationalism and cosmopolitanism – and its relation to the artistic practice, material culture and intellectual history of the period.
Topics for discussion could include, but are not limited to: artistic response to the luxury debates; landscape and nation; the connoisseur and the Grand Tour; the usefulness of labels (exotic, chinoiserie, rococo); the reception of Italy; the creation of a British national school; consumption & the meaning of goods; the local and the global/the provincial and the metropolitan; the issue of Englishness, Britishness, Scottishness.

Copyright… and non-copyright

Editorial in The British Art Journal, XII, 1


Setting scholarship – and shower-curtain design – free
http://britishart.yale.edu/collections/search

The Yale Center for British Art, New Haven, has placed digital images of its collections online. So far, so familiar. What is extraordinary is that all the images have been made available for reproduction free of charge, in superb high-resolution format, with no restrictions over use. Indeed, this applies to all the collections of Yale University. Other institutions in the USA are now considering whether to follow. The British Museum is the major institution that had already taken the same step in the UK. Otherwise the outlook in Britain is depressingly outdated, with museums and galleries, as this journal has frequently pointed out, obstructing not only scholarship but also wider familiarity with their collections through the imposition of restrictive conditions on use and punitive fees. What makes it worse, much worse, are the outrageous claims to ‘copyright’ that are attached to the use of images, preposterously applied to the mechanical reproduction of original works of art long out of copyright. This loathsome practice must stop.
The Yale Center found that the cost of collecting the fees was greater than the ‘pitiful’ sums it managed to accumulate under the old system, and that must be the case with the many museums and galleries in the UK that still adhere to the restrictive practices of the past. The Royal Collection, which has probably more objects of desire than almost anywhere else, certainly found that to be the case. Alas, having closed down its own fee collection ‘service’, the Royal Collection has taken the fateful step of placing its reproduction arrangements in the hands of none other than the Bridgeman Art Library, an agency much given to the issuing of the most restrictive and tendentious terms and conditions, and the charging of high fees. Now that digital image-making of the highest quality can be achieved by a toddler with the right equipment, any continuing attempts to create a pseudo-copyright in the UK by ‘licensing’ the use of images of out-of copyright works of art is outrageous, but it is also foolish.
Come on, Tate, National Portrait Gallery, National Gallery, Victoria & Albert Museum! Some of you (OK, not the Tate) have made a bit of an effort to make scholarly publication a little less expensive, although the whole process is still needlessly complicated, involving hordes of staff who could be better deployed on more frutiful exercises. But it is time to grow up, enter the twenty-first century, embrace the digital age, make it all free, and, like the Yale Center, discover the excitement of a host of new visitors across the globe poring over your collections. And by that we don’t mean attempting to decipher those mingy, mean, little, blurry, low-resolution, watermarked, restricted access, tantalising glimpses of great paintings you so reluctantly allow, and that merely drive people away. No. They must be like the Yale and BM images, available to be studied in the greatest detail on screen and – crucially – retained. So listen up, bring on the high-res download! Bring on the Leonardo shower-curtain and the Van Gogh bathmat! Free! That way people get to know the works of art you care for. After all, though it sometimes seems to be forgotten, that is your job.

So farewell then, Lucian Freud ((born 8 December 1922, died 21 July 2011). The Tate had a good oil (a little portrait of Francis Bacon) but it was stolen. Prejudices there against figurative painting being what they are, it bought very few of his oils, and then prices went through the roof. Not that you can see most of the Tate’s holdings on its website owing to ‘copyright restrictions’: genuine, but stupid, and not the Tate’s fault.
And no, we made no attempt to negotiate the ‘right’ to illustrate one of them on the cover.
Life, as Freud may now be lamenting in that great studio in the sky, is too short.

Berger Prize Winner 2011

William MB Berger Prize for British Art History 2011

The annual prize for best book in the history of British art, worth £5000, was won by Charlotte Gere and Judy Rudoe for Jewellery in the Age of Queen Victoria: A Mirror to the World published by British Museum Press. The prize was presented by A.N. Wilson at an evening reception held at the Paul Mellon Centre for Studies in British Art, 16 Bedford Square, Bloomsbury, London, on Tuesday 5 July 2011