British Studio Pottery: From Bernard Leach to Lucie Rie, The Treasury, Chichester Cathedral
Walter Hussey, the late Dean of Chichester Cathedral, practised the gentle art of 'blackmail' (his words, not mine) when he twisted the arms of the local councillors of Chichester to convert Pallant House, a fine 18th-century townhouse, into an art gallery fit to receive his gift of modern British art and studio ceramics in 1977.
Thanks to Hussey, Chichester now has an art museum boasting a collection that includes work by Barbara Hepworth, Henry Moore and Pablo Picasso hanging alongside old master prints and drawings by the likes of Albrecht Dürer, Jean-Antoine Watteau and Thomas Gainsborough.
In March 2006, Pallant House will reopen, having built a new extension, providing more gallery space, a new shop, cafe, learning space and reading room wrapped around a, no doubt, elegant garden.
While the gallery is a building site, part of Hussey's collection has returned home, in the shape of a temporary exhibition, British Studio Pottery: From Bernard Leach to Lucie Rie, curated by the Pallant House Gallery in the treasury of the late dean's cathedral.
Hussey was dean from 1955-1977, and, as the title of his autobiography proclaims, a 'patron of the arts'. He was an ambitious one at that, commissioning John Piper to design a tapestry for the high altar, Leonard Bernstein to compose the Chichester Psalms and, in 1961, Graham Sutherland to paint Noli me Tangere (Touch me not), which embellishes a small stone altarpiece in the Mary Magdalene chapel. His retirement gift to the cathedral in 1978 was a Marc Chagall stained-glass window.
Hussey believed that as long as the quality is 'right and good', there is no incongruity in juxtaposing art of different periods. In his commissions for the cathedral, he aimed to fuse ancient and modern. Displaying his collection of studio pottery alongside the treasury's other offerings is, therefore, entirely in keeping.
Pallant House has used two of the three permanent showcases in the treasury for the ceramics, bringing together works from its own collection with loans from University College, Chichester, and a number of private collections.
The three cases are elegantly built: double-sided with cantilevered arms off a stone core and top lit. The lighting is generally very good, especially for the pieces on the upper shelves, but not so for Alan Caiger-Smith's lustreware languishing on a gloomier lower ledge.
Sadly, the addition of the temporary showcases used to show more of the pottery falls short of Hussey's standard for setting ancient and modern side by side. Pallant House should have insisted on having all three cases, temporarily displacing more of the silverware to the cathedral's safe. There would be plenty left on show in the wall cases.
By and large the pots are grouped by their maker - such as Alison Britton, Hans Coper, Eric Mellon and Lucie Rie. But there is also an interesting grouping of form that brings together work by Norah Braden, Michael Cardew and Ursula Mommens, illustrating the art critic Charles Marriot's point that studio pottery is 'precisely abstract sculpture'.
Studio pottery is, of course, more than this. It is all about making something modern while drawing on the traditional methods that potters have used since Old Testament days.
Bernard Charles' communion set is an apt choice for the exhibition. The lidded patten dish is attractively incised with a fish design, which is echoed on the two candlesticks and chalice.
One of the most influential figures in studio pottery, Bernard Leach, also advocated the production of objects that were good to use and to look at. He combined animals and plants with simple patterns to decorate his work.
There are good examples of his work on show: a stoneware tile with wave design emphasises the balance of eastern and western influences for which he is best known. A small bottle vase decorated with a brushed bamboo motif made by his son and collaborator, David, is included here.
The illustrated handout identifies each piece, and it provides a brief history of each maker. But more information about the groupings to draw out the connections between the pieces and any spiritual reference would have been useful.
Chichester is a working cathedral, with all the clutter that entails; a coin-operated turnstile to access the treasury, noticeboards and stacked chairs.
But some of the clutter is charming - for example, a golden weather vane resting in a corner of the treasury after centuries on top of the spire. But curtaining off the treasury from the aisle seems unnecessary and ruins the sightlines.
According to the Bible, 'all the silver, and gold, and vessels of brass and iron [are] consecrated unto the Lord: they shall come into the Treasury of the Lord (Joshua, 6:19).'
While more could have been done to give the ceramics and the church plate the space each needs in the treasury, this exhibition would have delighted Hussey. Judging by the appreciative comments in the visitors' book, this is a feeling shared by much of Chichester.
Caroline Worthington is the curator of art at York Museums Trust
Project data
Cost: £1,000
Exhibition design: Pallant House Gallery
Curator: Simon Martin
Exhibition ends: 2 October 2005
Walter Hussey, the late Dean of Chichester Cathedral, practised the gentle art of 'blackmail' (his words, not mine) when he twisted the arms of the local councillors of Chichester to convert Pallant House, a fine 18th-century townhouse, into an art gallery fit to receive his gift of modern British art and studio ceramics in 1977.
Thanks to Hussey, Chichester now has an art museum boasting a collection that includes work by Barbara Hepworth, Henry Moore and Pablo Picasso hanging alongside old master prints and drawings by the likes of Albrecht Dürer, Jean-Antoine Watteau and Thomas Gainsborough.
In March 2006, Pallant House will reopen, having built a new extension, providing more gallery space, a new shop, cafe, learning space and reading room wrapped around a, no doubt, elegant garden.
While the gallery is a building site, part of Hussey's collection has returned home, in the shape of a temporary exhibition, British Studio Pottery: From Bernard Leach to Lucie Rie, curated by the Pallant House Gallery in the treasury of the late dean's cathedral.
Hussey was dean from 1955-1977, and, as the title of his autobiography proclaims, a 'patron of the arts'. He was an ambitious one at that, commissioning John Piper to design a tapestry for the high altar, Leonard Bernstein to compose the Chichester Psalms and, in 1961, Graham Sutherland to paint Noli me Tangere (Touch me not), which embellishes a small stone altarpiece in the Mary Magdalene chapel. His retirement gift to the cathedral in 1978 was a Marc Chagall stained-glass window.
Hussey believed that as long as the quality is 'right and good', there is no incongruity in juxtaposing art of different periods. In his commissions for the cathedral, he aimed to fuse ancient and modern. Displaying his collection of studio pottery alongside the treasury's other offerings is, therefore, entirely in keeping.
Pallant House has used two of the three permanent showcases in the treasury for the ceramics, bringing together works from its own collection with loans from University College, Chichester, and a number of private collections.
The three cases are elegantly built: double-sided with cantilevered arms off a stone core and top lit. The lighting is generally very good, especially for the pieces on the upper shelves, but not so for Alan Caiger-Smith's lustreware languishing on a gloomier lower ledge.
Sadly, the addition of the temporary showcases used to show more of the pottery falls short of Hussey's standard for setting ancient and modern side by side. Pallant House should have insisted on having all three cases, temporarily displacing more of the silverware to the cathedral's safe. There would be plenty left on show in the wall cases.
By and large the pots are grouped by their maker - such as Alison Britton, Hans Coper, Eric Mellon and Lucie Rie. But there is also an interesting grouping of form that brings together work by Norah Braden, Michael Cardew and Ursula Mommens, illustrating the art critic Charles Marriot's point that studio pottery is 'precisely abstract sculpture'.
Studio pottery is, of course, more than this. It is all about making something modern while drawing on the traditional methods that potters have used since Old Testament days.
Bernard Charles' communion set is an apt choice for the exhibition. The lidded patten dish is attractively incised with a fish design, which is echoed on the two candlesticks and chalice.
One of the most influential figures in studio pottery, Bernard Leach, also advocated the production of objects that were good to use and to look at. He combined animals and plants with simple patterns to decorate his work.
There are good examples of his work on show: a stoneware tile with wave design emphasises the balance of eastern and western influences for which he is best known. A small bottle vase decorated with a brushed bamboo motif made by his son and collaborator, David, is included here.
The illustrated handout identifies each piece, and it provides a brief history of each maker. But more information about the groupings to draw out the connections between the pieces and any spiritual reference would have been useful.
Chichester is a working cathedral, with all the clutter that entails; a coin-operated turnstile to access the treasury, noticeboards and stacked chairs.
But some of the clutter is charming - for example, a golden weather vane resting in a corner of the treasury after centuries on top of the spire. But curtaining off the treasury from the aisle seems unnecessary and ruins the sightlines.
According to the Bible, 'all the silver, and gold, and vessels of brass and iron [are] consecrated unto the Lord: they shall come into the Treasury of the Lord (Joshua, 6:19).'
While more could have been done to give the ceramics and the church plate the space each needs in the treasury, this exhibition would have delighted Hussey. Judging by the appreciative comments in the visitors' book, this is a feeling shared by much of Chichester.
Caroline Worthington is the curator of art at York Museums Trust
Project data
Cost: £1,000
Exhibition design: Pallant House Gallery
Curator: Simon Martin
Exhibition ends: 2 October 2005
