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Westoe Netty
The Westoe Netty is a painting by Robert Olley. It depicts a historical scene inside a public toilet (Netty is a Geordie dialect word for toilet). Painted in 1972, it has become a cultural symbol of North East England working class history. Olley was a former miner turned local artist, and his painting was inspired by a real toilet that was formerly sited in Westoe, South Shields. His painting depicted six working class men and a little boy using the netty, which was used by workers travelling to the nearby Westoe Colliery. The painting portrays the wall of the netty covered in humorous and often vulgar graffiti, reflecting many local phrases and cultural references. The original toilet was built in 1890. When the area it was sited in was earmarked for regeneration, the toilet was saved from demolition by friends of the artist, who dismantled it and put into storage in 1996 in a local shipyard. In 2008 the toilet was rebuilt as a permanent exhibit at the Beamish Museum, County D ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Robert Olley
Robert "Bob" Olley (born 16 January 1940) is an artist and sculptor best known for his mining subjects, humorous drawings and paintings of everyday life, especially his iconic painting and internationally acclaimed ''Westoe Netty''. Career Born into a mining family in 1940 and educated at Westoe Secondary Modern, Olley began his working life 1955 as a painter and decorator before going into the mining industry in which he spent eleven years at Whitburn Colliery until the pit closed 1968. Leaving the industry he joined Plessey Telecoms by which time he was developing his artistic talents with the hope of becoming a professional magazine illustrator supplementing his income by selling his paintings at the Sunday Painters Exhibition on Bayswater Road, London. By 1972 he had two exhibitions under his belt. It was in the second of these that the now world-famous painting ''Westoe Netty'' was first exhibited. There was an outcry of indecency from an alderman who attempted to have ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |