Work, Rest and Play

Small exhibition in the Sunley Room at the National Gallery which has already been on tour to Bristol's City Museum and Art Gallery and the Laing Art Gallery, in Newcastle upon Tyne.

It takes the opportunity too look at a bit of social history, how work and leisure have changed over the last 4000 years, and show this through works of art from the National Gallery’s own collection and loans from other galleries.

It was a good idea and done well but somehow left me wanting more! As it is such a small space it could almost have been worth doing two separate exhibitions to give more depth, however it was good to see the links between the themes. Works such as the acrylic sculpture “The Traveller” by Duane Hanson showed how leisure can actually be hard work.

There was the inevitable Lowry given the theme was work and a Ford Maddox Brown picture “Work” showing the sentimental view of the working classes in Victorian England. The most extraordinary piece was a roll of material from 1992 by Renee Green in toile de jouy style but using contemporary prints of the slave trade.

My favourite piece was Laura Knight’s “Ruby Loftus screwing a breech ring”. It was a fine detailed portrait but with thick brush strokes in her overall like the sleeves of a C17th Dutch portrait!

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