British Art - Tudor to interwar and influences on them

The story of British Art from medieval to the interwar period – an introduction

This series of six sessions is about how British Art evolved and why. It is deliberately limited to British Art and the chosen period because that is a meaty subject.  

Timing: Each session will start at 10.  They will finish before 12 when the room booking ends. How long some last may depend on the discussion of the topic or topics.  There will be a ten-minute break to allow anyone who wants to get a coffee or tea from the coffee shop just along Fisher Street to do so. But also, for us all to get a break, stand up and move about to say hi to fellow group members. 

Dates – Thursdays October 1st, 15th, 29th November 12th, 26th December 10th.

After a brief introduction to the late Anglo-Saxon period when our embroidery and books were highly valued in the rest of Europe, we will move on to the period after the Normans invaded. 

The Roman Catholic Church was a major supporter of art- both commissioning and as a recipient of work commissioned by pious wealthy people whose donations included paintings.  The only experience of the use of imagery for most people were the frescos in parish churches often with cheery messages about the bad outcomes if people misbehaved such as Doom. Some religious houses, including Lewes Priory became associated with high-quality wall paintings in churches they owned such as Clayton Church. They employed a full-time team of craftsmen.  Wealthy townsfolk commissioned murals for their main rooms, but few have survived.

During the Middle Ages very wealthy households moved from property to property to supervise their estates and to allow the castle or house they were occupying to be cleaned – a necessity in a world without running water in buildings and no sewers. Mobility also resulted in the need for portable furniture and decorations such as tapestries which were made by teams of needlewoman and men. English work was still highly valued in Europe. 

Beautifully illustrated books were still produced, but they were usually quite small to be portable. Many were produced in monasteries. Many were exported to the mainland. 

Some portraits of wealthy people were produced, and they increased in number as wealthy households moved less., and tombs were highly decorated. We will explore medieval art within a brief outline of what was happening in Europe..

What to look at: The Bayeaux tapestry is a great example of high-quality work that was made in England.  It was commissioned by Bishop Odo and hung in his cathedral at Bayeaux. It is on show at the British Museum from September 2026 for several months.  Frescoes at Clayton Church and elsewhere. Displays of manuscript books. Recreated medieval interiors in, for example, Dover castle.

The Tudors were aware of the value of the decorative arts and elaborately decorated clothes to impress.  They also collected portraits of members of their families, friends and political allies. Knole House at Sevenoaks has some good examples of these. One of the most curious local examples is Bishop Sherborne’s paintings of himself and all the previous Bishops of the diocese of Chichester as himself. This can be seen free in the Cathedral. 

We will look at the impact of Holbein and ask why he gets the attention that he does when there were other portrait painters at work at the court of Henry VIII. Many of them from the mainland and especially Germany and the Netherlands. Mary and Elizabeth also controlled how they were portrayed and employed artists of high quality.  But what about other wealthy Tudors and what were the other ways that they used art? 

By the end of the sixteenth century, Anglican churches were losing their colour, frescos and other decoration was not approved of and lime washed or destroyed.  With the decline of religious paintings artists had to find new ways of surviving. Portraits and landscapes were answers but what else could they do? 

What to look at and to listen to: portraits - Knole, the National Portrait Gallery.  Podcasts – see BBC Not Just the Tudors, very good podcast about Hans Holbein and another about ‘The Secrets Hidden in Tudor Art’ and ‘Fig leaves and a grumpy Jesus: Renaissance to Baroque Art.  You can play on your iPad or phone and work best if you have ear pods but fine without. 

Charles 1st was a great collector of works of art at the cost of the taxpayer. He was a patron of Van Dyke who painted him as the powerful ruler he wanted to be seen as.  The family also painted landscapes and maritime scenes drawing on Dutch art and other European influences – but who apart from the King bought them?  Charles I also collected work from other European artists – who did he favour and how did this collection influence British artists? 

Artists still worked during and after the Civil War – John Dobson did some excellent paintings of Royalists whilst King Charles was based in Oxford. 

The court of Charles II used portraits and other works of art to emphasise their wealth, but again the court, many of whom had been in in Europe during the Civil War used European artists. How does this change what British artist did?

What to look at - Firle Place and Petworth House have good collections.  Petworth House has a gallery built by the family to house paintings as well as some superb works in the main house many of which are C17th.  During the later 1700s and early 1800s, the Earl of Egremont allowed artists in to look at art and to learn by copying.  Other owners such as the Lennoxes of Goodwood did so – their collection in London was lost in a major fire. But Goodwood House also has a good collection. Tate Britain and other London Galleries have some works from this period. 

By the early 1700s, British artists were learning that to understand what their clients wanted they needed to travel abroad because that is where an increasing number of their male and female clients went and to learn from artists there, particularly to Rome. This was because Grand Tourists were buying abroad and art dealers in Rome and elsewhere were developing contacts with wealthy people in England who didn’t want to travel but wanted fashionable art.  The Fetherstonhaugh’s of Uppark went on a Grand Tour and both commissioned works of art. 

Artists also realised that training to a good standard should be available here and that standards needed to be raised to ensure that artists were regarded as a profession. The Royal Academy was founded with these and other objectives in mind.  Artists also founded other societies such as one for watercolour painters.  Naturally membership was limited to make them aspirational. The saga of Constable and the Royal Academy also revealed that it was a bit conservative in its taste – we will look at this saga about the criteria for becoming a member.  Women became members - Angelica Kaufman and Mary Moser were founding members. But as the Royal Academy explains on its website, they were treated differently – as shown in Zoffany’s portrait of the early members. The men are included and two life models but as a women attending a life class with male models was unthinkable, they are represented by portraits on the wall. Look up The Academicians of the Royal Academy, 1771-72 by J. Zoffany.

Topics to include the artists who made an impact in various ways such as Hogarth and Constable. And changes in techniques, the impact of science as well as the importance of patronage, changing taste and the impact of prints (especially cartoons by Gillray and others) and etching. Sporting Art (Stubbs and others) will be mentioned. 

What to see and do. Petworth, Uppark and Goodwood all have excellent art collections.  Firle too. 

The collection in Petworth is particularly good. Tate Britain which is a short walk from Victoria well worth a thought especially for the Turner Collection. Your TV channels have programmes about Turner and Constable – usually on the arts channels.

During the 1800s, a conservative mainstream developed which was helped by the development of a large and affluent middle-class group of patrons, and the publicity given by prints which were a far cheaper way of buying works of art.  But breakaway groups developed partly because the art market was getting bigger and publicity easier.  One of the best known was the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood – Rossetti and others.  Why did these groups emerge and how influential were they in their own time? Some of the new movements were supported by the rising number of very wealth middle class patrons.  Successful artists became very wealthy, some from working with the press and producing prints of their work.  Others by producing advertising for businesses.

Places to see -Leighton House, which was the home of Frederick, Lord Leyton (1830-1896) in Holland Park which has a stunning interior. He was a well-known painter.  Galleries include Tate Britain, The Walker Art Gallery in Liverpool where there was a circle of Pre-Raphaelite artists patronized by merchants and industrialists in the city.  The Lady Lever Art Gallery and Collection is another place in Liverpool. Manchester Art Gallery also holds a good collection. But the biggest collection is probably in the Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery (for more information see museumcrush.org). Hunt about on your TV and find programmes about the movement.

At Tate Britain until 27th September – an exhibition about an influential artist – American but influential on art here.  See also Walter Sickert at Tate Britain which seems to be permanent.

Some artists served in the army during the First World War, some of these and other artists were commissioned to paint a record of the war.  The Imperial War Museum was founded and a polite skirmish between the IWM and a body founded to commission works of art to record the war resulted. It influenced what was done. We will explore the story and the consequences

Locally we have the Charleston Group (at Charleston Farmhouse and Berwick Church) which began partly as a foundation by a group of conscientious objectors but who else was active and how did their contribute to changing British art?  Looking at Ravilious (trained at Eastbourne, excellent exhibition at the Towner Art Gallery at Eastbourne) and others – the age of the art school had arrived, and it is there that many got to know each other.  But earning a living was hard with so many artists and a period of economic recession – what helped many to survive? What were the influences on art of people who were interested in it such as the economist J M Keynes (the economist) and Roger Fry (the artist) as a writer. Who bought their work…there are a lot of artists competing for work. 

We will look at some of the artists and movements and explore why some became well known and others were less so. There are books about the Charleston Group in the shop at Charleston in Lewes. 

Comrades in Art: Artists Against Fascism 1933-1943. – Towner until 11 October 2026

Sorry about the strange presentation – off the Towner’s website 

This exhibition highlights the life and work of 11 members of the founding generation of the Artists International Association (AIA): Peggy Angus, Pearl Binder, James Boswell, James Fitton, Margaret Fitton, James Holland, Percy Horton, Peter Laszlo Peri, Betty Rea, Cliff Rowe and Nan Youngman. Their work is shown alongside works by prominent AIA exhibiting artists, including Ithell Colquhoun, Dame Laura Knight, Paul Nash and Lucien Pissarro, who supported the organisation and its campaigns for peaceful and cultural development and international understanding.

About the Artists International Association