George Frederic Watts: Poems on Canvas

Useful small exhibition at Tate Britain looking at G.F.Watts’s ideas for a series of murals called “The House of Life”.

Watt’s planned this series to show the evolution of humanity but it was never realised however he did work through many of the ideas in easel paintings. I hadn’t realised he donated 18 of these to the new Tate gallery in 1897 and when it opened two of the eight rooms were contemplative spaces dedicated to him. He also showed his work in the East End and made cheap prints available.

This display had just six of the works on show, two long horizontal works, “Chaos” and “Sic Transit” and four larger works including the well known “Hope”. I’d not seen most of these works before. They now feel a bit overblown but I was interested to see some resemblance in “Mammon” shown here to Bacon’s screaming popes in the way a large, imposing figure looms out of the dark but maybe that was just the mood I was in.

Closes 25 September 2022

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