Mark Bills stepped into a difficult position when he became executive director of the 18th-century artist Thomas Gainsborough’s house nearly three years ago.
The previous director of the museum and gallery in Sudbury, Suffolk, had been made redundant by the house’s trustees, who had since taken over the running of the place. But Bills is no stranger to such tricky situations.
Having come from the Watts Gallery in Compton, Surrey, where he was the curator, Bills had a huge amount of experience that he could apply to Gainsborough’s House. Working alongside director Perdita Hunt, Bills helped transform the Watts Gallery into a successful museum. But things were very different when he arrived in 2006.
“It was Miss Havishamesque,” Bills says. “I’ve never seen a picture store like the one at the Watts Gallery in my life, and I’ve seen lots of picture stores. They’re usually messy, but I’d never seen anything like that.”
Bills was given a cold and run-down apartment attached to the gallery to live in. And while the romance of a dilapidated museum might be appealing to some, the standards had slipped so far that it needed a huge amount of work.
One of the first things Bills did at the Watts Gallery was look back into its history and research it thoroughly.
“What I found was that the Watts Gallery had changed radically over the past 100 years,” he says. “So a lot of the work was centred around putting back what was orig- inally there and finding the funds to do it.”
Gainsborough’s House was not in such a dreadful physical state, though its financial position was fairly dire. Bills has spent nearly three years working hard to turn things around. An important milestone is this month’s application to the Heritage Lot- tery Fund (HLF) for a grant to redevelop the museum and gallery.
“I see it as my job to shout about this area and Gainsborough more,” says Bills. “There are very few art galleries in Suffolk, so we feel we need to create a big exhibition space, because it’s something the county needs.”
If he gets the funding required, Bills plans to demolish an existing structure next to Gainsborough’s House and create a building that would house space for temporary exhibitions, a gallery devoted to Gainsborough, an education room, a community art space, offices and an event space. The whole project would cost around £8m, with £4.5m coming from the HLF.
Surrounding landscape
The new building will also allow visitors to get up on to the roof to admire the country- side that surrounds the gallery.
“The idea is that you will get this wonderful view over the town and, beyond that, the landscape that Gainsborough painted. You can see the landscape in his famous painting Mr and Mrs Andrews from up there.”
Bills is already involving the community in his proposed plans, with consultation sessions about what the building should look like if it gets built.
“It’s very important that we don’t see our- selves as separate from the town,” he says. “We’re part of it, so we work with the local businesses and people.”
The main industry in Sudbury is silk weaving – the town houses four major mills, one that supplies the Royal palaces, the oth- ers major fashion labels. “The foundations of the new extension would need a layer of rubber so they don’t transmit vibrations from the adjacent silk mill,” says Bills.
He also hopes to use products from the mills in the exhibition programme. “I want to bring the story of Gainsborough the man more alive, and he probably would have worn silk pantaloons,” Bills says. “We also want to be able to show his work against its traditional background of woven silk.”
The house holds just under 30 oil paintings by Gainsborough, some of his letters, as well as many other objects associated with him, including a lock of his hair, his sword stick, his bespoke painting desk, and even the pocket watch he retrieved from a highwayman who stole it. But there are other stories Bills wants to bring out.
“Music was important to Gainsborough,” he says. “We want to bring that to life with classical performances.”
The exhibition that has just begun at the house shows Bills’s broad vision. The Paint- ing Room (until 21 February 2016) explores how artists worked in a domestic setting, before studios were called studios.
The show recreates an 18th-century painting room, with artefacts including contemporaneous “odd things” such as linseed oil, painting tables, chairs, and even a life-size artist’s mannequin.
How did The Painting Room come about? “I found this box of paint bladders, pig’s bladders that artists used to keep paint col- ours in,” says Bills.
“One of the amazing things is you feel the weight of them; the red is very light and the white much heavier because it’s full of lead. They inspired the whole project. We can’t say they were Gainsborough’s, we can’t rule it out either, but an individual donor was so interested in them that they gave money to fund a project.”
Funding for the exhibition also came from the Esmée Fairbairn Collections Fund. Bills has also secured support for the gallery from other organisations, including the National Association of Decorative and Fine Arts Societies and the Paul Mellon Centre for Studies in British Art.
Staying afloat
Arts Council England has also awarded Gainsborough’s House a three-year grant to fund a development officer position for day- to-day fundraising.
The Friends scheme costs £55 and gives members free entry (adult admission is £6.50). The gallery has a number of other ways to keep money rolling in too, including selling editions of prints made in the onsite print workshop.
The house has a tiered patrons scheme. Mulberry patrons are the highest payers at £1,000 a year – they are given a silver mulberry brooch made at the local silk mills and, on top of the tours and dinners that other patrons get, they also receive a jar of mulberry jam made from mulberries picked from the 400-year-old tree in Gainsborough’s garden.
Bills is broadening the outlook of the gal- lery with new schemes such as a recent two- day conference developed in partnership with the Paul Mellon Centre. The house is also working on museum interpretation with the Rijksmuseum Twenthe, Enschede, Holland, the first gallery to buy a Gainsborough work.
And Bills is considering touring shows to galleries in Europe: “If the nationals do it, there’s no reason regionals can’t. We can get together a group of like-minded galleries in Europe to share costs and apply for funding.”
Bills has a long list of other aims, including starting an annual Gainsborough lecture, running more practical print demonstrations, using the house’s garden for weddings and other hire opportunities, and working with contemporary artists and designers inspired by Gainsborough.
He is also looking at opportunities provided by the Local Enterprise Partnership for New Anglia, which has recently released funds for a big cultural tourism strategy over the next three years. And he is part of a forum for the heads of Suffolk museums; he emphasises that working together is really important.
Gainsborough worked tirelessly to capture the essence of landscape in his painting and now Bills is working hard to capture the essence of Gainsborough.
“People remember the things that make an impression on them, the places that have been inspiring to them. That’s what I think museums should try to be, because all the rest will follow.”
Gainsborough’s House at a glance
The 18th-century painter Thomas Gainsborough was born in 1727 in Sudbury, Suffolk, in what is now known as Gainsborough’s House. He lived there with his family until the age of 13 when he left for artistic study in London. He returned to the house in 1749, on the event of his father’s death, but left again in 1752.
The campaign to raise the funds to purchase Thomas Gainsborough’s birthplace began in 1956, and the house was opened to the public in 1961, but had no collection.
The house is now a gallery and museum and runs exhibitions, a learning programme and a print studio.
The collection consists of nearly 30 works by Gainsborough, objects associated with the artist, and some of his letters.
Seven full-time staff run the museum and gallery. Visitor numbers of 22,500 last year were the highest ever. Admission is £6.50 for adults.
Mark Bills at a glance
Mark Bills studied fine art at the Slade School of Art, and later did a PhD on the early 20th-century artist- group, the Vorticists.
He then worked at English Heritage for two years cataloguing the collection at Brodsworth Hall in Yorkshire, close to where he is from.
He went on to work as a visual arts officer in 1994 at the Russell Cotes Art Gallery and Museum, Bournemouth, and then became the senior curator of paintings, prints and drawings at the Museum of London in 2001.
In 2006 he was appointed curator at the Watts Gallery in Compton, Surrey. In 2013 he joined Gainsborough’s House in Sudbury, Suffolk, as its director.
The previous director of the museum and gallery in Sudbury, Suffolk, had been made redundant by the house’s trustees, who had since taken over the running of the place. But Bills is no stranger to such tricky situations.
Having come from the Watts Gallery in Compton, Surrey, where he was the curator, Bills had a huge amount of experience that he could apply to Gainsborough’s House. Working alongside director Perdita Hunt, Bills helped transform the Watts Gallery into a successful museum. But things were very different when he arrived in 2006.
“It was Miss Havishamesque,” Bills says. “I’ve never seen a picture store like the one at the Watts Gallery in my life, and I’ve seen lots of picture stores. They’re usually messy, but I’d never seen anything like that.”
Bills was given a cold and run-down apartment attached to the gallery to live in. And while the romance of a dilapidated museum might be appealing to some, the standards had slipped so far that it needed a huge amount of work.
One of the first things Bills did at the Watts Gallery was look back into its history and research it thoroughly.
“What I found was that the Watts Gallery had changed radically over the past 100 years,” he says. “So a lot of the work was centred around putting back what was orig- inally there and finding the funds to do it.”
Gainsborough’s House was not in such a dreadful physical state, though its financial position was fairly dire. Bills has spent nearly three years working hard to turn things around. An important milestone is this month’s application to the Heritage Lot- tery Fund (HLF) for a grant to redevelop the museum and gallery.
“I see it as my job to shout about this area and Gainsborough more,” says Bills. “There are very few art galleries in Suffolk, so we feel we need to create a big exhibition space, because it’s something the county needs.”
If he gets the funding required, Bills plans to demolish an existing structure next to Gainsborough’s House and create a building that would house space for temporary exhibitions, a gallery devoted to Gainsborough, an education room, a community art space, offices and an event space. The whole project would cost around £8m, with £4.5m coming from the HLF.
Surrounding landscape
The new building will also allow visitors to get up on to the roof to admire the country- side that surrounds the gallery.
“The idea is that you will get this wonderful view over the town and, beyond that, the landscape that Gainsborough painted. You can see the landscape in his famous painting Mr and Mrs Andrews from up there.”
Bills is already involving the community in his proposed plans, with consultation sessions about what the building should look like if it gets built.
“It’s very important that we don’t see our- selves as separate from the town,” he says. “We’re part of it, so we work with the local businesses and people.”
The main industry in Sudbury is silk weaving – the town houses four major mills, one that supplies the Royal palaces, the oth- ers major fashion labels. “The foundations of the new extension would need a layer of rubber so they don’t transmit vibrations from the adjacent silk mill,” says Bills.
He also hopes to use products from the mills in the exhibition programme. “I want to bring the story of Gainsborough the man more alive, and he probably would have worn silk pantaloons,” Bills says. “We also want to be able to show his work against its traditional background of woven silk.”
The house holds just under 30 oil paintings by Gainsborough, some of his letters, as well as many other objects associated with him, including a lock of his hair, his sword stick, his bespoke painting desk, and even the pocket watch he retrieved from a highwayman who stole it. But there are other stories Bills wants to bring out.
“Music was important to Gainsborough,” he says. “We want to bring that to life with classical performances.”
The exhibition that has just begun at the house shows Bills’s broad vision. The Paint- ing Room (until 21 February 2016) explores how artists worked in a domestic setting, before studios were called studios.
The show recreates an 18th-century painting room, with artefacts including contemporaneous “odd things” such as linseed oil, painting tables, chairs, and even a life-size artist’s mannequin.
How did The Painting Room come about? “I found this box of paint bladders, pig’s bladders that artists used to keep paint col- ours in,” says Bills.
“One of the amazing things is you feel the weight of them; the red is very light and the white much heavier because it’s full of lead. They inspired the whole project. We can’t say they were Gainsborough’s, we can’t rule it out either, but an individual donor was so interested in them that they gave money to fund a project.”
Funding for the exhibition also came from the Esmée Fairbairn Collections Fund. Bills has also secured support for the gallery from other organisations, including the National Association of Decorative and Fine Arts Societies and the Paul Mellon Centre for Studies in British Art.
Staying afloat
Arts Council England has also awarded Gainsborough’s House a three-year grant to fund a development officer position for day- to-day fundraising.
The Friends scheme costs £55 and gives members free entry (adult admission is £6.50). The gallery has a number of other ways to keep money rolling in too, including selling editions of prints made in the onsite print workshop.
The house has a tiered patrons scheme. Mulberry patrons are the highest payers at £1,000 a year – they are given a silver mulberry brooch made at the local silk mills and, on top of the tours and dinners that other patrons get, they also receive a jar of mulberry jam made from mulberries picked from the 400-year-old tree in Gainsborough’s garden.
Bills is broadening the outlook of the gal- lery with new schemes such as a recent two- day conference developed in partnership with the Paul Mellon Centre. The house is also working on museum interpretation with the Rijksmuseum Twenthe, Enschede, Holland, the first gallery to buy a Gainsborough work.
And Bills is considering touring shows to galleries in Europe: “If the nationals do it, there’s no reason regionals can’t. We can get together a group of like-minded galleries in Europe to share costs and apply for funding.”
Bills has a long list of other aims, including starting an annual Gainsborough lecture, running more practical print demonstrations, using the house’s garden for weddings and other hire opportunities, and working with contemporary artists and designers inspired by Gainsborough.
He is also looking at opportunities provided by the Local Enterprise Partnership for New Anglia, which has recently released funds for a big cultural tourism strategy over the next three years. And he is part of a forum for the heads of Suffolk museums; he emphasises that working together is really important.
Gainsborough worked tirelessly to capture the essence of landscape in his painting and now Bills is working hard to capture the essence of Gainsborough.
“People remember the things that make an impression on them, the places that have been inspiring to them. That’s what I think museums should try to be, because all the rest will follow.”
Gainsborough’s House at a glance
The 18th-century painter Thomas Gainsborough was born in 1727 in Sudbury, Suffolk, in what is now known as Gainsborough’s House. He lived there with his family until the age of 13 when he left for artistic study in London. He returned to the house in 1749, on the event of his father’s death, but left again in 1752.
The campaign to raise the funds to purchase Thomas Gainsborough’s birthplace began in 1956, and the house was opened to the public in 1961, but had no collection.
The house is now a gallery and museum and runs exhibitions, a learning programme and a print studio.
The collection consists of nearly 30 works by Gainsborough, objects associated with the artist, and some of his letters.
Seven full-time staff run the museum and gallery. Visitor numbers of 22,500 last year were the highest ever. Admission is £6.50 for adults.
Mark Bills at a glance
Mark Bills studied fine art at the Slade School of Art, and later did a PhD on the early 20th-century artist- group, the Vorticists.
He then worked at English Heritage for two years cataloguing the collection at Brodsworth Hall in Yorkshire, close to where he is from.
He went on to work as a visual arts officer in 1994 at the Russell Cotes Art Gallery and Museum, Bournemouth, and then became the senior curator of paintings, prints and drawings at the Museum of London in 2001.
In 2006 he was appointed curator at the Watts Gallery in Compton, Surrey. In 2013 he joined Gainsborough’s House in Sudbury, Suffolk, as its director.