I spent a large part of the summer reading and thinking about Peter Frankopan’s book The Silk Roads. He talks of the true Mediterranean – nothing to do with water, but the centre of the world, where civilisation began and where people with ideas and goods flowed from, linking continents and crossing seas.
It is a powerful book, and as I read on I thought increasingly of how Leighton House, where I am a trustee, is a wonderful example of this flow of cargo, concept and connectivity.
The Victorian artist Frederic, Lord Leighton, with the help of friends and travellers, including the explorer Richard Burton, accumulated a fabulous collection of Iznik tiles. They were brought back along the Silk Roads of his day to the extraordinary house he built incorporating the ideas and dreams of both East and West.
In these uncertain times, the harmony that Leighton created and the way he used his house to promote not only his work but the arts and music of others is something for us all to think on.
Emma Verey is a trustee for Leighton House in London and the Watts Gallery in Surrey
It is a powerful book, and as I read on I thought increasingly of how Leighton House, where I am a trustee, is a wonderful example of this flow of cargo, concept and connectivity.
The Victorian artist Frederic, Lord Leighton, with the help of friends and travellers, including the explorer Richard Burton, accumulated a fabulous collection of Iznik tiles. They were brought back along the Silk Roads of his day to the extraordinary house he built incorporating the ideas and dreams of both East and West.
In these uncertain times, the harmony that Leighton created and the way he used his house to promote not only his work but the arts and music of others is something for us all to think on.
Emma Verey is a trustee for Leighton House in London and the Watts Gallery in Surrey
