The Bowes Museum is an

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 town of

Barnard Castle Barnard Castle (, ) is a market town on the north bank of the River Tees, in County Durham, Northern England. The town is named after and built around a medieval castle ruin. The town's Bowes Museum's has an 18th-century Silver Swan automato ...

, in

County Durham County Durham ( ), officially simply Durham,UK General Acts 1997 c. 23Lieutenancies Act 1997 Schedule 1(3). From legislation.gov.uk, retrieved 6 April 2022. is a ceremonial county in North East England.North East Assembly �About North East E ...

in northern England. It was built to designs by Jules Pellechet and John Edward Watson to house the art collection of

John Bowes John Bowes may refer to: *John George Bowes (c. 1812–1864), Canadian politician *John Bowes (art collector) (1811–1885), English art collector and thoroughbred racehorse owner **John Bowes (steamship), ''John Bowes'' (steamship), 1852 steam coll ...

and his wife Joséphine Benoîte Coffin-Chevallier, and opened in 1892. It contains paintings by

El Greco Domḗnikos Theotokópoulos ( el, Δομήνικος Θεοτοκόπουλος ; 1 October 1541 7 April 1614), most widely known as El Greco ("The Greek"), was a Greek painter, sculptor and architect of the Spanish Renaissance. "El G ...

Francisco Goya Francisco José de Goya y Lucientes (; ; 30 March 174616 April 1828) was a Spanish romantic painter and printmaker. He is considered the most important Spanish artist of the late 18th and early 19th centuries. His paintings, drawings, and ...

Canaletto Giovanni Antonio Canal (18 October 1697 – 19 April 1768), commonly known as Canaletto (), was an Italian painter from the Republic of Venice, considered an important member of the 18th-century Venetian school. Painter of city views or ...

Jean-Honoré Fragonard Jean-Honoré Fragonard (; 5 April 1732 (birth/baptism certificate) – 22 August 1806) was a French painter and printmaker whose late Rococo manner was distinguished by remarkable facility, exuberance, and hedonism. One of the most prolific ar ...

and

François Boucher François Boucher ( , ; ; 29 September 1703 – 30 May 1770) was a French painter, draughtsman and etcher, who worked in the Rococo style. Boucher is known for his idyllic and voluptuous paintings on classical themes, decorative allegories ...

, together with items of decorative art,

ceramics A ceramic is any of the various hard, brittle, heat-resistant and corrosion-resistant materials made by shaping and then firing an inorganic, nonmetallic material, such as clay, at a high temperature. Common examples are earthenware, porcelain ...

textile Textile is an umbrella term that includes various fiber-based materials, including fibers, yarns, filaments, threads, different fabric types, etc. At first, the word "textiles" only referred to woven fabrics. However, weaving is not the ...

tapestries Tapestry is a form of textile art, traditionally woven by hand on a loom. Tapestry is weft-faced weaving, in which all the warp threads are hidden in the completed work, unlike most woven textiles, where both the warp and the weft threads may ...

, clocks and costumes, and objects of local historical interest. Some early works of

Émile Gallé Émile Gallé (8 May 1846 in Nancy – 23 September 1904 in Nancy) was a French artist and designer who worked in glass, and is considered to be one of the major innovators in the French Art Nouveau movement. He was noted for his designs of ...

were commissioned by Coffin-Chevallier. There is an eighteenth-century Silver Swan

automaton An automaton (; plural: automata or automatons) is a relatively self-operating machine, or control mechanism designed to automatically follow a sequence of operations, or respond to predetermined instructions.Automaton – Definition and More ...

, which periodically preens itself, looks round and appears to catch and swallow a fish.

History

The Bowes Museum was purpose-built as a public art gallery for

and his wife Joséphine Benoîte Coffin-Chevallier, Countess of

Montalbo Montalbo is a municipality in the province of Cuenca, part of the autonomous community of Castile-La Mancha, in the country of Spain , image_flag = Bandera de España.svg , image_coat = Escudo de España (mazonado).svg ...

, who both died before it opened in 1892. Bowes was the son of

, the 10th Earl of Strathmore and Kinghorne, although he did not inherit the title as he was deemed illegitimate under Scottish law. His grandmother was

Mary Bowes, Countess of Strathmore and Kinghorne Mary Eleanor Bowes, Countess of Strathmore and Kinghorne (24 February 1749 – 28 April 1800) was a notable member of the British aristocracy during the Georgian period (18th century). Referred to by some as "The Unhappy Countess", she was a ...

. It was designed with the collaboration of two architects, the French architect Jules Pellechet and John Edward Watson of

Newcastle Newcastle usually refers to: *Newcastle upon Tyne, a city and metropolitan borough in Tyne and Wear, England *Newcastle-under-Lyme, a town in Staffordshire, England *Newcastle, New South Wales, a metropolitan area in Australia, named after Newcastle ...

. The building is richly modelled, with large windows, engaged columns, projecting bays, and mansard roofs typical of the

French Second Empire The Second French Empire (; officially the French Empire, ), was the 18-year Imperial Bonapartist regime of Napoleon III from 14 January 1852 to 27 October 1870, between the Second and the Third Republic of France. Historians in the 1930s a ...

, set within landscaped gardens. An account in 1901 described it as "... some 500 feet in length by 50 feet high, and is designed in the French style of the First Empire. Its contents are priceless, consisting of unique Napoleon relics, splendid picture galleries, a collection of old china, not to be matched anywhere else in the world, jewels of incredible beauty and value; and, indeed, a wonderful and rare collection of art objects of every kind." Among those with less favourable opinions was

Nikolaus Pevsner Sir Nikolaus Bernhard Leon Pevsner (30 January 1902 – 18 August 1983) was a German-British art historian and architectural historian best known for his monumental 46-volume series of county-by-county guides, ''The Buildings of England'' (1 ...

, who considered it to be "... big, bold and incongruous, looking exactly like the town hall of a major provincial town in France. In scale it is just as gloriously inappropriate for the town to which it belongs (and to which it gives some international fame) as in style". Construction on the building began in 1869; Bowes and his wife left an endowment and 800 paintings. Their collection of European fine and decorative arts amounted to 15,000 pieces. Olivia Boteler Porter before and after restoration

Olivia Boteler Porter before and after restoration

A major redevelopment of the Bowes Museum began in 2005. To date, improvements have been made to visitor facilities (shop, cafe and toilets); galleries (new Fashion & Textile gallery, Silver gallery and English Interiors gallery); and study/learning facilities. The three art galleries, on the second floor of the museum, were updated at the same time. The museum holds temporary exhibitions, and has shown works by

Monet Oscar-Claude Monet (, , ; 14 November 1840 – 5 December 1926) was a French painter and founder of impressionist painting who is seen as a key precursor to modernism, especially in his attempts to paint nature as he perceived it. During ...

Raphael Raffaello Sanzio da Urbino, better known as Raphael (; or ; March 28 or April 6, 1483April 6, 1520), was an Italian painter and architect of the High Renaissance. List of works by Raphael, His work is admired for its clarity of form, ease of ...

Turner Turner may refer to: People and fictional characters *Turner (surname), a common surname, including a list of people and fictional characters with the name * Turner (given name), a list of people with the given name *One who uses a lathe for turni ...

Sisley Alfred Sisley (; ; 30 October 1839 – 29 January 1899) was an Impressionist landscape painter who was born and spent most of his life in France, but retained British citizenship. He was the most consistent of the Impressionists in his dedicatio ...

, Gallé,

William Morris William Morris (24 March 1834 – 3 October 1896) was a British textile designer, poet, artist, novelist, architectural conservationist, printer, translator and socialist activist associated with the British Arts and Crafts Movement. He ...

, and

Toulouse-Lautrec Comte Henri Marie Raymond de Toulouse-Lautrec-Monfa (24 November 1864 – 9 September 1901) was a French painter, printmaker, draughtsman, caricaturist and illustrator whose immersion in the colourful and theatrical life of Paris in the la ...

. The BBC announced in 2013 that a ''

Portrait of Olivia Porter The ''Portrait of Olivia Porter'' is an oil painting on canvas by Anthony van Dyck, showing Olivia, Lady Porter, the wife of Sir Endymion Porter, daughter of John Boteler, 1st Baron Boteler of Bramfield, and niece of the Duke of Buckingham, a z ...

'' was a previously unknown

Anthony van Dyck Sir Anthony van Dyck (, many variant spellings; 22 March 1599 – 9 December 1641) was a Brabantian Flemish Baroque artist who became the leading court painter in England after success in the Southern Netherlands and Italy. The seventh c ...

painting. It had been found in the Bowes Museum storeroom by art historian Dr. Bendor Grosvenor who had observed it on-line at the

Your Paintings Art UK is a cultural, education charity in the United Kingdom, previously known as the Public Catalogue Foundation. Since 2003, it has digitised more than 220,000 paintings by more than 40,000 artists and is now expanding the digital collection t ...

web site. The painting itself was covered in layers of varnish and dirt, and had not been renovated. It was originally thought to be a copy, and valued at between £3,000 to £5,000. Christopher Brown, director of the

Ashmolean Museum The Ashmolean Museum of Art and Archaeology () on Beaumont Street, Oxford, England, is Britain's first public museum. Its first building was erected in 1678–1683 to house the cabinet of curiosities that Elias Ashmole gave to the University of ...

, confirmed it was a van Dyck after it had been restored. File:Gheeraerts Portrait of a Lady.jpg, Attributed to

Marcus Gheeraerts the Younger Marcus Gheeraerts (also written as Gerards or Geerards; 1561/62 – 19 January 1636) was a Flemish artist working at the Tudor court, described as "the most important artist of quality to work in England in large-scale between Eworth and van ...

, ''Portrait of a Lady (unknown date) File:Anselm van Hulle - Family Portrait Group.jpg,

Anselm van Hulle Anselm van Hulle or Anselmus van Hulle (Gent, 1601 - 1674/1694) was a Flemish painter mainly of portraits whose works were highly prized at the Northern European Courts. He was court painter to the Prince of Orange and was one of the few portra ...

, ''Family Portrait Group'' (1640–1650) File:Coello - Mariana of Austria as a Widow.jpg,

Claudio Coello Claudio Coello (2 March 1642 – 20 April 1693) was a Spanish Baroque painter. Coello is considered the last great Spanish painter of the 17th century. The son of Faustino Coello, a famous Portuguese sculptor, he was a court painter for Char ...

, ''La reina madre doña Mariana de Austria'', circa 1687 File:Corrado Giaquinto - Venus Presenting Arms to Aeneas - WGA08968.jpg,

Corrado Giaquinto Corrado Giaquinto (8 February 1703 – 18 April 1766) was an Italian Rococo painter. Early training and move to Rome He was born in Molfetta. As a boy he apprenticed with a modest local painter Saverio Porta, (c1667–1725), escaping the rel ...

, ''Venus Presenting Arms to Aeneas'', 1750 File:Pietro Ottoboni by Francesco Trevisani.jpg,

Francesco Trevisani 200px, ''Portrait of Cardinal Pietro Ottoboni ''by Francesco Trevisani. The Bowes Museum, Barnard Castle, County Durham">Barnard_Castle.html" ;"title="Bowes Museum, Barnard Castle">Bowes Museum, Barnard Castle, County Durham, England. Frances ...

, ''Portrait of Cardinal Pietro Ottoboni'', 1700 File:Paul Jean Baptiste Lazerges, Still Life with Crabs and Bottle, Bowes Museum..jpg, Paul Jean Baptiste Lazerges, ''Still Life with Crabs and Bottle'',

References

External links

*
Paintings
from the Bowes Museum on VADS
Information
from the 24 Hour Museum
The Bowes Museum at Google Cultural Institute
{{Authority control Art museums and galleries in County Durham Museums in County Durham Decorative arts museums in England Second Empire architecture Grade I listed buildings in County Durham Former private collections in the United Kingdom Fashion museums in the United Kingdom Art museums established in 1892 1892 establishments in England Barnard Castle

History

Further reading

References

External links