Catalogue: The Public Catalogue Foundation, South Yorkshire: Sheffield

How do you choose an image to represent all of the paintings in a collection when there are over 2,000 to choose from?

The cover of the South Yorkshire: Sheffield catalogue is a portrait of Edith Sitwell, painted in 1918 by Roger Fry in his studio in Fitzroy Street shortly after Sitwell arrived in London.

She was a member of the Bloomsbury Group along with Fry and went on to become one of the most important experimental British poets of her generation. This painting now seems like the most logical choice to represent Sheffield.

It typifies the Modern British works that are the strength of Sheffield’s collection and it depicts a local girl, as Sitwell grew up at Renishaw Hall near Sheffield with her two literary brothers. It was presented to Sheffield, along with 700 other works of art, by John George Graves, a key benefactor to the collection and the Graves Gallery, which bears his name.

It wasn’t, however, a unanimous choice. The Public Catalogue Foundation had already chosen a selection of paintings that would be used as full-page images. About 10 were offered as potential cover shots and our task at Museums Sheffield was to give them our choices in order of preference.

A painting by local artist Stanley Royle of his wife, Morning on the Derbyshire Moors, would have appealed to the Sheffield audience, but there were concerns about its wider appeal.

Another potential cover was The Infant Christ Asleep on the Cross by Bartolomé Esteban Murillo, one of the great Old Master paintings featured in the collection.

It was felt, however, that a religious-themed painting wouldn’t best reflect the strengths of our collection. A contemporary work showing a line drawing of Sheffield was seen as not striking enough to feature on the cover.

The debate was extensive and involved a wide cross section of staff including the chief executive, commercial manager and art curators, all with differing perspectives.

Everyone agreed that the catalogue needed something that would appeal to a wide audience, both locally and nationally. After much discussion it was decided that Sitwell fitted the bill; an eye-catching work by a significant artist that highlighted the best of Sheffield’s collections.

Liz Waring is the curator of visual art at Museums Sheffield