Newsletter No 29 Winter 2008 to Lindsay’s appreciation of Byzantine art (see the From the Chair catalogue ‘A Poet in Paradise’: Lord Lindsay and Christian Art ). My research relates to this topic, as it is I can’t believe I’m writing “winter” at the top of this concerned with the Byzantine underpinnings and their newsletter when summer (what there was of it) transformation by a little known Italian painter, who seems to have come and gone so quickly. Thanks to was almost an exact contemporary of Cimabue. The all of you who sent such positive feedback about the triptych consists of a central panel showing The Death newsletter last issue – it’s really important to know of St. Ephraim and Scenes from the Lives of the Thebaid what members think about what we’re doing. Saints , while the wings treat of six scenes of the Hopefully you’ll find some interesting features in this Passion of Christ. There is a stylistic and issue, including a very special offer from the Public iconographical discrepancy between the two parts – Catalogue Foundation on page 9 – don’t miss it! i.e. central panel and wings – which has led authors to Matthew Jarron question if they are by the same hand. I would like to consider the possibility that this discrepancy points to New SSAH Grant Scheme different stages of Italian reception to Byzantine art, which co-existed in the late thirteenth century. This year we launched a scheme offering research Grifo’s choice of iconographical motifs, their stylistic support grants from £50 to £300 to assist with treatment and the manipulation of pictorial space can research costs and travel expenses. Applications are help explain the exact nature of the Italo-Byzantine continuing to arrive and here is another report from style (or the maniera greca ), a much used, but rather one of the recipients on how the money has been vague, term. spent. The grant enabled me to go to Edinburgh (from Oxford) and to spend two days there. I went to Clemena Antonova see the triptych once on my own and once with Prof. The Research Support Grant (£170) that I received Martin Kemp, my former supervisor at Oxford, who from the Scottish Society for Art History was used gave me some useful directions for my work. I hope towards research on a medieval Italian triptych by to be ready with my text shortly, and am very grateful Grifo di Tancredi at the National Gallery of Scotland. to the Scottish Society for Art History for this The intended outcome of this research will be an opportunity! article entitled “Grifo di Tancredi’s Triptych at the National Gallery of Scotland: On the Nature of Italo- For further information on the SSAH grant scheme, Byzantine Art”. The triptych (c.1290-1300) was part contact: of Lord Lindsay’s collection. In 2000 the National Daniel F. Herrmann Gallery of Scotland organised an exhibition on Lord Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art Lindsay, the famous Scottish collector of Italian 75 Belford Road, Edinburgh EH4 3DR primitives, which drew attention, among other things, [email protected] 1 deterioration of artworks and to instil permanence into SSAH Events man-made structures in the face of the eroding forces of nature and time. Et in Arcadia Ergo… Hand, Heart & Soul Nicola Ireland reviews the SSAH Sculpture Tour at the Dean Gallery and the Scottish National Gallery of Modern Gillian Peebles describes Elizabeth Cumming’s tour for Art. members of the arts and crafts exhibition at Aberdeen Art Gallery. th The weather was kind to us for our tour on the 19 April with plenty of spring sunshine and a bracing breeze Elizabeth Cumming’s Hand, Heart and Soul – book and that created delightful ripples upon the water of Charles exhibition – is self-evidently a labour of love. The Jencks’s Landform. The tour was led by Daniel Scottish Arts and Crafts movement is, literally, in her Herrmann, Curator of the Paolozzi Collection and SSAH blood – she is a direct descendant of William Skeoch committee member and Dr Patricia Andrew, an art Cumming artist designer who founded Edinburgh’s historian who specialises in landscape painting and Dovecot Studio in 1912. She herself is probably best garden history. The focus was on the placement of known for championing the work of Phoebe Anna sculptures within their surrounding environment and the Traquair. On 26 th July SSAH members were privileged to challenges of conservation outside the controlled join Elizabeth for a tour of the Aberdeen leg of the environment of the art gallery. exhibition. On one of the sunniest weekends of the Daniel Herrmann started by providing a brief summer, Aberdeen seemed positively continental and background to the grounds at the Dean Gallery and the the gallery glowing in the final throes of re-hang and Gallery of Modern Art emphasising their former improvement. institutional associations. He discussed the oldest piece At Edinburgh City Art Centre last summer, the of sculpture in the grounds, La Vierge d’Alsace (1919-21) exhibition was grand, exhaustive but never exhausting by Emile-Antoine Bourdelle at the Dean Gallery before and seemed perfect for the space. The smaller Aberdeen we moved further up the path to examine Richard version was equally so but allowed different stars to Long’s Macduff Circle (2002). This latter piece provoked shine. Where Edinburgh had space for several specially an intense discussion on the maintenance of artworks made films of Arts and Crafts houses, Aberdeen showed within natural settings in the face of nature’s proclivity to just one but it was juxtaposed neatly beside furniture colonise and how often this reclamation of ephemeral and ornaments appropriate to the property. One of our artworks by nature can be an inherent part of their number recognised the bedstead! The show included concept. Dr Patricia Andrew then discussed Ian examples of furniture, textiles, metalwork and glass. Hamilton Finlay’s Six Defintions (2001) and highlighted the Designs for public spaces were contrasted with the very conscious and delicious irony of Finlay’s evocations of personal and domestic. Well-known artists and Arcadian ideals and the juxtaposition of Six Definitions craftsman like Charles Rennie Mackintosh and Robert with the rather prosaic space of the car park. The Finlay Lorimer shared billing with those lesser known but well plaques by the allotments at the entrance of the Dean deserving of attention. A particular star of the show, and Gallery were also examined before we crossed over the a revelation for those of us not from Aberdeen, was the road to the Gallery of Modern Art where Daniel local artist and jeweller James Cromar Watt who crafted Herrmann focused on Rachel Whiteread’s Untitled (Pair) superb and intimate jewellery. The more intimate display (1999). Nowhere is the challenge of preserving external at Aberdeen allowed for detailed consideration of the sculpture in our wet, northern climate more evident works on paper, the embroideries and domestic than in this piece which relies on clinical and pristine artefacts. A second viewing of the exhibition highlighted surfaces to carry its meaning and its associations with the sense of a style whose time has come. mortuary slabs. Dr Patricia Andrew then concluded the Elizabeth Cumming has the gift of wearing her tour at Charles Jencks’s Landform (2001) where the learning lightly and communicating her enthusiasm for concepts behind this structure were discussed along the subject at just the right level for each audience. The with the issues of the maintenance of an artwork whose material felt fresh and interesting, and it is to be hoped impact is in part due to order and structure having been that this wonderful and highly successful exhibition will imposed upon the organic. encourage people back to the book. Whilst looking at Rachel Whiteread’s sculpture, Poussin’s Et in Arcadia Ergo had been evoked in (Hand, Heart and Soul – The Arts and Crafts Movement in connection with this piece – the imprint of death within Scotland by Elizabeth Cumming is published by Birlinn verdant and idyllic surroundings. To a certain extent this (ISBN 9781841586106) paperback - £16.99) concept of decay in Arcadia could be seen to be a metaphor for the way in which we strive to prevent the 2 http://www.arthist.arts.gla.ac.uk/Research/Mapping%20 Conferences & Seminars Sculpture/index.htm Mapping Sculpture Seminar Material Matters: Materiality in Contemporary th 7 November 2008, Hunterian Art Gallery Art 20 th November 2008, Edinburgh College of Art Mapping the Practice and Profession of Sculpture in Britain and Ireland 1851-1951 is the first comprehensive study of sculptors, related businesses and trades investigated in the context of creative collaborations, art infrastructures, professional networks and cultural geographies. By presenting the results of the research through an online database, published articles and exhibitions at the Victoria & Albert Museum and Henry Moore Institute, the project will broaden the way the medium is seen and understood and contribute new methods of approaching art practice. The University of Glasgow will host the first of three annual project seminars showcasing new and unpublished research from the Mapping Sculpture 1851-1951 project on 7 th November 2008 at the Hunterian Art Gallery Lecture Theatre from 1.30- 5pm. This year's seminar includes papers by four members of the research team, these will by followed by an open discussion: Introduction - Professor Alison Yarrington, Glasgow University Session One, Chair: Marjorie Trusted FSA, Senior Curator of