Newport Museum and Art Gallery ( cy, Amgueddfa ac Oriel Gelf Casnewydd) (known locally as the City Museum ( cy, Amgueddfa Dinas)) is a museum, library and

art gallery An art gallery is a room or a building in which visual art is displayed. In Western cultures from the mid-15th century, a gallery was any long, narrow covered passage along a wall, first used in the sense of a place for art in the 1590s. The lon ...

in the city of

Newport Newport most commonly refers to: *Newport, Wales *Newport, Rhode Island, US Newport or New Port may also refer to: Places Asia *Newport City, Metro Manila, a Philippine district in Pasay Europe Ireland *Newport, County Mayo, a town on the ...

, South Wales. It is located in Newport city centre on

John Frost Square John Frost Square is a large public space in the centre of Newport, South Wales, named after the Chartist leader, John Frost. It was redeveloped as part of the Friars Walk shopping and leisure complex in 2014 and 2015. Major features on John ...

and is adjoined to the

Kingsway Shopping Centre The Kingsway Shopping Centre is an under-cover shopping centre in Newport city centre, Wales. The northern entrance is on John Frost Square adjoining the Friars Walk shopping and leisure complex. The east entrance is off Commercial Street and t ...

The collections

Newport Museum opened in 1888. The collections include Archaeology, Social History, Art and Natural History. The most ancient artefacts in the museum are tools made by hunter-gatherers who walked the shores of the Severn estuary hundreds of thousands of years ago. The Roman collections rank amongst the best in Wales, comprising material excavated from the Roman town of Caerwent and the fortress at

Caerleon Caerleon (; cy, Caerllion) is a town and community in Newport, Wales. Situated on the River Usk, it lies northeast of Newport city centre, and southeast of Cwmbran. Caerleon is of archaeological importance, being the site of a notable Roman ...

. The Medieval and later collections feature finds from local castles and priories, including an outstanding assemblage from

Penhow Castle Penhow Castle, Penhow, Newport dates from the early 12th century. Extended and reconstructed in almost every century since, it has been claimed to be the oldest continuously-inhabited castle in Wales. The castle is a Grade II* listed building. Hi ...

. The most significant items of Social History are the Chartist collection of weapons, broadsheets, prints and silver from the 1839 Chartist uprising in Newport and the Transporter Bridge archive, which includes all of the original designs for the bridge and photographs of its construction. The Fine Arts collections includes paintings by Sir

Stanley Spencer Sir Stanley Spencer, CBE RA (30 June 1891 – 14 December 1959) was an English painter. Shortly after leaving the Slade School of Art, Spencer became well known for his paintings depicting Biblical scenes occurring as if in Cookham, the small ...

, Dame Laura Knight and L S Lowry, and Welsh artists such as Kyffin Williams, Ceri Richards and Stanley Lewis. The Decorative Art collections feature the John Wait teapot collection and the Iris Fox collection of porcelain and

Wemyss ware Wemyss Ware was a line of pottery first produced in 1882 by Czech decorator Karel Nekola and Fife pottery-owner Robert Heron. The pottery took its name from the Wemyss family, titled incumbents of Wemyss Castle on the east coast of Fife, who we ...

and sculpture by Sir Jacob Epstein and studio ceramics by

Lucy Rie Dame Lucie Rie, (16 March 1902 – 1 April 1995) () was an Austrian-born British studio potter. Life Early years and education Lucie Gomperz was born in Vienna, Lower Austria, Austria-Hungary, the youngest child of Benjamin Gomperz, a Jewi ...

and Ewen Henderson.

Art gallery

As well as a museum, the building is home to Newport's principal

. The gallery hosts a wide variety of British paintings,

watercolour Watercolor (American English) or watercolour (British English; see spelling differences), also ''aquarelle'' (; from Italian diminutive of Latin ''aqua'' "water"), is a painting method”Watercolor may be as old as art itself, going back to t ...

s and

contemporary art Contemporary art is the art of today, produced in the second half of the 20th century or in the 21st century. Contemporary artists work in a globally influenced, culturally diverse, and technologically advancing world. Their art is a dynamic com ...

works. The largest collection is known as the John & Elizabeth Wait Collection. Past exhibitions at the gallery have attracted controversy. In 2008 a painting of a naked woman smoking was removed from display after a complaint from a bishop. When it was put back, 20,000 people queued to see it. In October 2011 the council apologised for ''The Institute of Mental Health is Burning '' exhibition, where explicit sex scenes were put on display (and published in a free supplement) without any warning notices. In 2013 the temporary exhibitions programme was threatened with closure after Arts Council funding was withdrawn. Welsh actor Michael Sheen spoke out against the closure threat. The post of Visual Arts Officer was to be scrapped (after more than 25 years) and the temporary shows replaced with a static exhibition from the permanent art collection. Possibly the final temporary exhibition, ''Shift'', by Welsh artist David Garner was launched in April 2013 following a public demonstration against the proposed closure. Garner created a special artwork, ''A Case of the Great Money Trick'', which was inspired by the campaign to keep the gallery open.Stephen Palmer
"Newport Art Gallery: protests continue as final show opens"
Art News, 19 April 2013. Retrieved 3 June 2013. The temporary exhibition programme closed after the conclusion of ''Shift''.

Newport Central Library

The museum building is also home to the city's public Central Library. It has a large collection of books and articles and is the headquarters of Newport's library network which includes Maindee and Caerleon libraries. In March 2012 it was reported that the

Chartist Mural The Chartist Mural was a mosaic mural designed by Kenneth Budd and created in 1978 in a pedestrian underpass in Newport, Wales. It commemorated the Newport Rising of 1839, in which an estimated 22 demonstrators were killed by troops. It was ...

by Kenneth Budd in John Frost Square was to be recreated in Newport Central Library as part of the redevelopment of the area.Natalie Crockett
Chartist mural to be re-created in library
''South Wales Argus'', 22 March 2012. Retrieved 5 November 2013. The mural was demolished in 2013 and discussion on a replacement memorial is ongoing.

References

External links

Newport Museum's collection over 45 pages on Gathering the JewelsNewport Museum on the City of Newport website
{{Authority control Culture in Newport, Wales History of Newport, Wales Museums in Newport, Wales Art museums and galleries in Wales Local museums in Wales Natural history museums in the United Kingdom Museums of ancient Rome in Wales Archaeological museums in Wales City museums in the United Kingdom 1888 establishments in Wales Museums established in 1888

The collections

Art gallery

Newport Central Library

See also

References

External links