Horsham Museum & Art Gallery – Page 4

Toys and Fundraising at Horsham Museum

Toovey’s toy specialist, Chris Gale, with some of his favourite recent discoveries

Toovey’s toy valuation event in support of the Horsham Museum & Art Gallery is becoming an annual event. Toovey’s specialist toys valuer, Christopher Gale, will be at the museum on Saturday, 18th February 2017, between 10am and 12noon providing free auction valuations and advice on your toy trains, cars, teddy bears, dolls and collectors’ toys.

Chris Gale says: “A third of the seller’s commission for items subsequently auctioned by Toovey’s will be donated by us to Horsham Museum to help with its important work.”

A Hornby ‘Princess Elizabeth’ O Gauge electric train with original box

I ask Chris about his favourite recent discoveries. He shows me a Hornby O Gauge electric train with original box. He says ‘This is one of Hornby’s finest models and reflects the design of the original steam engine. The original Princess Elizabeth locomotive was designed by Mr W. A. Stainer and was built at the Crewe Works in Cheshire. It was one of the first 4-6-2 engines built by The London Midland Scottish Railway (LMSR). The Princess Elizabeth became the most famous of the giant LMSR locomotives when, in 1936, she covered the 401.4 mile run between Glasgow and London at an average speed of 70mph whilst hauling a train. The toy train was produced with the guidance and advice of LMSR.” The model, dating from 1937, looks resplendent in its ‘crimson lake’ livery and the detailing is marvellous.

A Dinky Toys no. 163 Bristol 450 and Sports Coupé and no. 236 Connaught racing car both with their original boxes and an array of sports cars

I love the Dinky Toys no. 163 Bristol 450 Sports Coupé and no. 236 Connaught racing car, both with their original boxes. Bristol and Connaught both raced at Goodwood in the 1950s. Chris comments “Toy cars and tin plate toys always have a strong following. Dinky cars, for example, delight grown-up collectors as they did when they were boys. And they love rare models which aren’t too play worn!”

Chris Gales’ enthusiasm is infectious and his knowledge of toys never fails to impress.

The toy displays at Horsham Museum are marvellous. Bring your toy trains, cars, teddy bears, dolls and collectors’ toys to see Chris Gale between 10am and 12noon on Saturday, 18th February 2017, for a morning of fun and free pre-sale valuations at the Horsham Museum & Art Gallery, The Causeway, Horsham, RH12 1HE. Toovey’s next specialist toy sale will be held on 21st March 2017. A third of the seller’s commission for items seen at the event and subsequently auctioned by Toovey’s will be donated to the Friends of Horsham Museum. Sellers will receive the full amount they would normally get but they will know that they have helped the Museum as well.

By Rupert Toovey, a senior director of Toovey’s, the leading fine art auction house in West Sussex, based on the A24 at Washington. Originally published in the West Sussex Gazette.

Concert Celebrates the Life of Henry Burstow

This Saturday a remarkable concert at St Mary’s Parish Church in the Causeway, Horsham, commemorates the life of Henry Burstow who died 100 years ago this year.

Burstow’s love of Bell Ringing and Folk Songs will be celebrated in words, dance, music and bell ringing by the Horsham Bell Ringers, the Horsham Folk Club, the Broadwood Morris Men, the Friends of Horsham Museum and international violinist, Andrew Bernardi, playing the 1696 Stradivarius.

Andrew Bernardi plays the ‘Lark Ascending’ on the 1696 Stradivarius

Henry Burstow was Horsham’s cobbler, a bell ringer and folk singer. Writing about his love of folk music Burstow said ‘In learning and retaining all my songs my memory has seemed to work quite spontaneously: many of the songs I learnt at first time of hearing; others, longer ones, I have learnt upon hearing them twice through.’ His knowledge and memory of Sussex folk music drew the attention of Lucy Broadwood and the composer, Ralph Vaughan Williams, who visited the area in 1904.

Celebrating the life of Henry Burstow with Dance, Music and Bell Ringing

Vaughan Williams’ famous ‘Lark Ascending’ will be performed by Andrew Bernardi and members of his critically acclaimed Music Group, String Academy and Christs’ Hospital Director of music, Andrew Cleary. This extraordinary piece of music rises and falls as though accompanying a skylark’s flight in the folds of the Sussex Downs. The composer was inspired by specific lines from George Meredith’s poem of the same title which dates from 1881. They were originally printed on the flyleaf of Vaughan Williams’ musical score:

‘He rises and begins to round,
He drops the silver chain of sound,
Of many links without a break,
In chirrup, whistle, slur and shake.
For singing till his heaven fills,
‘Tis love of earth that he instils,
And ever winging up and up,
Our valley is his golden cup
And he the wine which overflows
to lift us with him as he goes.
Till lost on his aerial rings
In light, and then the fancy sings.’

There is a Eucharistic quality to the way that Vaughan Williams draws these particular lines together from Meredith’s much longer poem. It never fails to move and uplift me.

Writing about bell ringers in his reminiscences Henry Burstow said ‘To all brother campanologists and friends who remain of the hundreds with whom I have had the pleasure of meeting I offer my kind regards, and thanks for the hearty welcome and good fellowship they have always shown me.’ With bell ringers at the heart of this event you can be assured of a warm welcome on Saturday.

This unique concert takes place this weekend on Saturday 22 October at 7.30pm at St Mary’s Parish Church, Causeway, Horsham, West Sussex, RH12 1HE. Advance tickets are priced at £10 each and can be purchased from the Capitol Box Office by telephoning 01403 750220 and from The Horsham Museum and Art Gallery. Tickets will also be available on the night at £12.50 each. The funds raised by the concert will be donated to the Friends of Horsham Museum. For more information visit www.thecapitolhorsham.com or www.horshammuseum.org.

By Rupert Toovey, a senior director of Toovey’s, the leading fine art auction house in West Sussex, based on the A24 at Washington. Originally published in the West Sussex Gazette.

Tate Gallery Curator Opens Horsham’s Festival of Watercolours

Alison Smith, Tate Gallery’s Lead Curator of British Art to 1900, at Horsham Museum & Art Gallery

‘In Pursuit of the Watercolours’ is at the centre of a festival celebrating British watercolour painting at the Horsham Museum and Art Gallery. The exhibition was opened by the Tate Gallery’s Lead Curator of British Art to 1900, Alison Smith, in the company of Horsham District Council Chairman, Christian Mitchell and a large gathering of art lovers.

As I reported last week the museum has recently changed its collecting policy and is seeking to collect not only Sussex related art, but also watercolours by the greatest exponents of the medium. It represents a remarkable opportunity to form a collection of national significance.

The project will require the continued patronage of The Friends of Horsham Museum, as well as collectors, businesses, trusts and institutions, in order to acquire watercolours. Toovey’s have already donated work.

From left to right: Jonathan Chowen, Nicholas Toovey, Christian Mitchell and Jeremy Knight

Tate Curator, Alison Smith, expressed her delight to find important watercolourists like J.M.W. Turner, Francis Wheatley, Thomas Rowlandson, John Varley and John Piper represented in an exhibition at Horsham. She praised the Horsham District Council (HDC) for its support of the Horsham Museum & Art Gallery, offering particular thanks to HDC Deputy Leader and Cabinet Member for Leisure and Culture, Jonathan Chowen, and Curator, Jeremy Knight. Alison went on to acknowledge the ‘enormous’ contribution made by picture specialist, Nicholas Toovey, to the exhibition and catalogue, as well as Toovey’s Fine Art Auctioneers long term support of the Museum. She concluded by wishing the Horsham Museum & Art Gallery every success in forming its new watercolour collection.

Dudley Hardy (1867-1922) – ‘The Bird Fanciers’, watercolour, loaned from a private collection

The domestic scale and subtle nature of many English watercolours are particularly suited to the British temperament, sensibilities and weather. But watercolour offers artists a depth of colour too. Watercolourists have often recorded the world at home and abroad. During the 19th century there was an increasing interest in the exotic, especially the art, architecture and culture of North Africa, Arabia and the Middle East. Art reflecting these subjects is now known as ‘orientalism’. Dudley Hardy produced many orientalist works and my eye is taken by his watercolour ‘The Bird Fanciers’ which is a prime example of the genre. Here Hardy fuses the compositional elements of his father, Thomas Bush Hardy, with the exotic landscape, costume and colours of Algiers.

Whilst the exhibition centres on the Golden Age of watercolour painting in Britain in the 18th and early 19th centuries it also has work from the 17th to the 21st century including paintings by leading contemporary watercolourist, Gordon Rushmer. Gordon is holding a series of masterclasses at the museum to support the festival and collection.

Toovey’s picture specialist, Nicholas Toovey, will be at The Horsham Museum & Art Gallery, The Causeway, Horsham, RH12 1HE, between 10am and 12noon, this Saturday, 1st October 2016. He will be sharing his passion for the British watercolour and offering free valuations on your pictures. Come and discover whether your watercolour is actually by a famous artist!

To support the building of this important new collection of watercolours a third of the seller’s commission for items seen at the event which are subsequently auctioned by Toovey’s will be donated to the Friends of Horsham Museum. Sellers will receive the full amount they would normally get but will know that they have helped the Museum as well.

The accompanying catalogue provides a marvellous introduction and insight to the delights of British watercolours. To find out more about ‘In Pursuit of the Watercolour’ exhibition and events in the Horsham Museum & Art Gallery’s Festival of Watercolours go to www.horshammuseum.org or telephone 01403 254959.

By Rupert Toovey, a senior director of Toovey’s, the leading fine art auction house in West Sussex, based on the A24 at Washington. Originally published in the West Sussex Gazette

Exciting New Collection at Horsham Museum & Art Gallery

John Claude Nattes (c.1765-1839), Horsham on a windy day, 1792, Purchased with the aid of the aid of the V & A Purchase Fund and the Friends of Horsham Museum

In 2010 the Horsham Museum became the Horsham Museum & Art Gallery. Visitor numbers have soared, more than doubling in the last six years, making it one of the most visited art and heritage attractions in the South East of England. It is clear that there is an enormous appetite for art in the Horsham District.

Responding to this demand the museum has recently changed its collecting policy. It is seeking to collect not only Sussex related art, but also watercolours by the greatest exponents of the medium. It represents a remarkable opportunity to form a collection of national and international significance, especially as prices for fine watercolours continue to represent exceptional value for money.

The project will require the continued patronage of The Friends of Horsham Museum, and the Chasemore fund, as well as collectors, businesses, trusts and institutions, to acquire watercolours. I am delighted that Toovey’s have already donated work. The new collection will allow the Horsham Museum & Art Gallery to borrow major works from national museums, broadening the breadth and quality of its already exciting exhibition program.

None of this would be possible without the Horsham District Council’s understanding of the importance of art and heritage to the identity and economy of Horsham and the broader district. Jonathan Chowen, Horsham District Council Cabinet Member for Arts, Heritage & Leisure, and his team are deserving of our thanks for their continued long term support of the Horsham Museum & Art Gallery.

‘In Pursuit of the Watercolour’ is the latest exhibition at the Horsham Museum and Art Gallery. The exhibition celebrates the English pre-eminence in the medium of watercolour painting from the mid-18th century to the present day. The show is predominately formed of rarely seen watercolours from private collectors and ten works from the Worthing Museum and Art Gallery, including a wonderful view of the beach at Dover by J. M. W. Turner.

Curated by Jeremy Knight, the exhibition puts a spotlight on the broad range of watercolour painting between the 18th and 21st centuries.

The exhibition makes apparent how British watercolour painting moves from the recording of the topographical to a Romantic, personal impression of a particular place. Many argue that the poetic landscape of the romantic imagination is born out of Constable and Turner’s work.

Joseph Mallord William Turner (1775-1851), A beach scene at Dover, Loaned by Worthing Museum and Art Gallery

J.M.W. Turner would famously break free from the confines of convention and tradition recording impressions of the elemental in nature. The grey wash of his landscape ‘A beach at Dover’, gives a dramatic impression. It is a great treat to observe this rarely seen work.

John Claude Nattes’ landscape ‘Horsham on a Windy Day’ reflects something of the Horsham District’s rural identity today. It was acquired for the collection with help from the V & A Purchase Fund and the Friends of Horsham Museum.

Clarkson Frederick Stanfield RA (1793-1867), Study for the oil painting A Market Boat on the Scheldt, circa 1826, donated by Toovey’s Auctioneers & Valuers to Horsham Museum and Art Gallery’s Watercolour Collection

Clarkson Frederick Stanfield’s ‘A Market Boat on the Scheldt’, is a study for an oil painting in the V & A. and has been donated by Toovey’s Auctioneers & Valuers to the Horsham Museum and Art Gallery’s Watercolour Collection. After Turner, Stanfield was considered the greatest marine painter in Britain at the time. John Ruskin preferred Stanfield’s watercolours to his oils as they were more natural and less contrived. He thought him the ‘leader of our English Realists’.

I am proud that Toovey’s are sponsoring the exhibition and catalogue ‘In pursuit of the watercolours’. Toovey’s picture specialist, Nicholas Toovey, will be fund raising for the collection between 10am and 12noon on Saturday, 1st October 2016, offering free pre-sale valuations on your watercolours, prints and paintings at the Horsham Museum & Art Gallery, The Causeway, Horsham, RH12 1HE. A third of the seller’s commission for items seen at the event which are subsequently auctioned by Toovey’s will be donated to the Friends of Horsham Museum. Sellers will receive the full amount they would normally get but they will know that they have helped the Museum as well. This exceptional exhibition runs from 24th September to 15th October 2016 and admission is free.

By Rupert Toovey, a senior director of Toovey’s, the leading fine art auction house in West Sussex, based on the A24 at Washington. Originally published in the West Sussex Gazette.

Bring your toys and come and play

Toovey’s toy specialist, Christopher Gale, offering advice on a collection of toys

Toovey’s specialist toys valuer, Christopher Gale, is returning to the Horsham Museum & Art Gallery this coming Saturday, 21st May 2016, between 10am and 12noon. He will be providing free auction valuations and advice on your toy trains, cars, teddy bears, dolls and collectors’ toys. Chris Gale says: “A third of the seller’s commission for items subsequently auctioned by Toovey’s will be donated by us to Horsham Museum to help with its important work.”

A Märklin for Bassett-Lowke gauge O electric 4-2-0 locomotive

I ask Chris what toys he hopes to see this weekend. He replies “I’ve discovered some fine toys at these Horsham Museum valuation events like the Steiff teddy bear which Toovey’s sold for £1800!” He pauses and continues “We have had a number of exceptional Bassett-Lowke toy models come to auction recently.” Bassett-Lowke were toy retailers from the late 19th to the mid-20th century. Their knowledge of British railway design and influence over the market was huge. They often commissioned these toys from German manufacturers like Märklin. Chris comments “These models were wonderful in their proportion and expensive so they were usually looked after. Condition and originality is really important to today’s collector but even playworn examples fetch a good price. A toy’s box and packaging will also have a positive effect on value.” The Bassett-Lowke O gauge electric train shown here in Southern livery was manufactured by Märklin. It came with a reproduction box and realised £460.

A Bassett-Lowke live steam model 'Fast Motor Boat Streamlinia'

Chris explains that although Bassett-Lowke is famous for the toy trains it commissioned and made it also produced battleships and model boats. The Bassett-Lowke live steam model ‘Fast Motor Boat Streamlinia’ had a wooden deck, cream painted superstructure and hull with brass fixings and working rudder. Measuring 100cm in length and complete with its original box it made £1800.

A pre-war Dinky Toys No. 28h delivery van 'Sharp's Toffee Maidstone'

Chris continues “Toy cars and tin plate toys always have a strong following. Dinky cars, ships and planes, for example, delight grown-up collectors as they did when they were boys. And they love rare models like the pre-war ‘Sharp’s Toffee Maidstone’ van which Toovey’s sold for £460.”

Bring your toy trains, cars, teddy bears, dolls and collectors’ toys and come to play with toys specialist Chris Gale between 10am and 12noon this Saturday, 21st May 2016, for a morning of fun and free pre-sale valuations at the Horsham Museum & Art Gallery, The Causeway, Horsham, RH12 1HE. Who knows, your old toys could just be your hidden treasure! A third of the seller’s commission for items seen at the event and subsequently auctioned by Toovey’s will be donated to the Friends of Horsham Museum. Sellers will receive the full amount they would normally get but they will know that they have helped the Museum as well. The toy displays at Horsham Museum have just been refurbished so there is much to delight and see as well!

By Rupert Toovey, a senior director of Toovey’s, the leading fine art auction house in West Sussex, based on the A24 at Washington. Originally published in the West Sussex Gazette.