Favourites in the frame at gallery
IT MADE a huge stir with its 2016 commission, when thousands stripped off and daubed themselves in blue paint in the name of art.
The following year, when Hull celebrated being UK City of Culture, a record-breaking 519,000 people streamed through the doors of Ferens Art Gallery – a stark contrast to recent months.
The gallery, which only reopened last week following months of closure due to the coronavirus pandemic, is now setting out to reunite people with the paintings they love.
It is asking art lovers to nominate their favourite works for a celebratory exhibition later this year.
Ferens Favourites will tell the story of the municipal art collection, with people asked to explain the reasons behind their choice.
Coun Marjorie Brabazon, who chairs Hull Culture and Leisure, said: “Visitors to the gallery have grown up with these artworks.
“They are treasured and, in many cases, have inspired people to engage and fall in love with art.
“Lockdown hid these wonderful artworks from us, but only temporarily. This exhibition will be a fitting celebration of our Ferens favourites and will enable visitors to reunite with the artworks they love.”
Coun Marjorie Brabazon, who chairs Hull Culture and Leisure.
Internationally renowned artist Ian McKeever visited the gallery many times as a boy – initially to shelter while waiting for the bus but as time went on, fostering a burgeoning interest in art.
Asked to choose his favourite, McKeever, who grew up in Withernsea, picked Stanley Spencer’s Greenhouse and Garden (1937).
McKeever, whose work was celebrated in a retrospective exhibition at the Ferens, said: “Just occasionally one sees a painting which for whatever reason sticks in the mind,
THE VAST, storm-tossed painting, Ulysses and the Sirens, by the Leeds-born artist Herbert Draper, is one of the evergreen favourites at Ferens Art Gallery.
Another popular work is Victorian artist Rosa Bonheur’s ultra-realistic big cat study, The Lion at Home.
Then there are the photographs of naked blue people, taken by famed US photographer Spencer Tunick in 2016, which made headlines around the world.
The gallery is also known for its collection of 20th century British art, taking in William Roberts, Paul Nash, Stanley Spencer and Ben Nicholson. becomes a part of one’s living consciousness, so to speak.
“Such a work for me is Stanley Spencer’s modest painting of a bunch of onions hanging on a greenhouse wall, Greenhouse and Garden, which I first saw as a boy at the Ferens in the 1950s.
“Of all the things one could paint, the grand themes of life, why paint a bunch of humble onions? This question mystified me.”
Left, Spencer Tunick with his photograph, Sea of Hull; above, a member of staff admires Ulysses and the Sirens; below, Ian McKeever; inset: Stanley Spencer.
Opened in 1927, the Ferens Art Gallery was gifted to the city by TR Ferens, a local industrialist who also established a purchasing fund that has allowed its collections to grow in quality and range.
One of the outstanding regional art collections in the UK, it has almost 800 paintings, covering a wide array of subjects, styles and techniques.
The Ferens underwent a £4.5m makeover to enable it to host the Turner Prize in 2017.
Among its notable visitors that year were Prince Charles and Camilla, Duchess of Cornwall who attended the annual Open Exhibition, with the Duchess falling for a £300 oil painting of an avocado by Ilkley artist Helen Brayshaw.
Visit www.ferensfavourites. co.uk for an entry form and instructions on how to take part in the upcoming exhibition.
The permanent collection can be viewed at www.artuk. org/visit/venues/ferens-artgallery-3518.
Visitors to the gallery have grown up with these artworks.