Richard Dadd, The Flight out of Egypt, 1849-50, Tate. |
British Orientalist Painters in the 19th Century, a Colonial Landscape |
Frederick Lewis, Hhareem Life, Constantinople, 1857, © Laing Art Gallery, Tyne & Wear Museums.
Arthur Melville, An Arab Interior, 1881, courtesy National Galleries of Scotland.
Frederic Leighton, Courtyard of a Mosque at Bursa (1867), 1867, Cecil Higgins Art Gallery, Bedford. |
Tate Britain The exhibition reveals the wealth of Orientalist painting which followed the arrival of steam travel in the 19th century. Art and tourism flourished in places that were now relatively easy to reach by boat, and artists were drawn to visit and paint the areas they explored including Cairo, Jerusalem and Istanbul (Constantinople), often travelling via Spain and Morocco, or through Greece and the Balkans. The exhibition examines how British painters sought to convince their audiences of the authenticity of their images, often by using intensely detailed compositions. It also shows how deriving drama and romance from the Orient was central to their work. In images of the harem and of the Holy Land, in particular, these two impulses were often in fascinating tension, leaving the viewer to question the accuracy of the subjects they were depicting. The Lure of the East: British Orientalist Painting surveys the history of British painters’ representations of the Middle East from the 17th to the early 20th centuries. It explores the range of artistic responses to the peoples, cities and landscapes of the regions lying just across the Mediterranean from Europe. Bringing together over 110 pictures and watercolours from collections around the world, The Lure of the East includes major works by celebrated British painters such as Pre-Raphaelite William Holman Hunt, Richard Dadd, Lord Leighton and John Frederick Lewis. It also brings together many important and rarely seen works from private collections. The exhibition looks at the long tradition of British sitters being portrayed in different varieties of Oriental dress, and its themes include landscapes, cityscapes, genre scenes, the harem and the Holy City. Highlights include Gavin Hamilton’s huge canvas James Dawkins and Robert Wood Discovering the Ruins of Palmyra, 1758 (National Gallery of Scotland), the portraits of Lord Byron by Thomas Phillips 1814 (Government Art Collection) and Lawrence of Arabia by Augustus John, 1919 (Tate), William Allan’s Slave Market, Constantinople, 1838 (National Gallery of Scotland), John Frederick Lewis’s The Seraff – A Doubtful Coin, 1869 (Birmingham Museums and Art Gallery), David Roberts’s panoramic view of the ancient city of Baalbec in Lebanon, 1861 (Sharjah Art Museum), Richard Dadd’s Flight out of Egypt, 1849/50 (Tate) and John Frederick Lewis’s Hhareem Life, Constantinople, 1857 (Laing Art Gallery, Newcastle-upon-Tyne). The exhibition also inevitably engages with ongoing debates around the concept of "Orientalism" — the representation of the East in Western arts and literature — and its political contexts. Organised by Tate Britain in association with the Yale Center for British Art, The Lure of the East is curated by Nicholas Tromans (Senior Lecturer, Faculty of Art, Design and Architecture, Kingston University, London). The exhibition opens first at the Yale Center (February 7-April 28 2008) before coming to Tate Britain. Afterwards, in collaboration with the British Council, it travel to the Pera Museum, Istanbul (October 2008-January 2009) and the Sharjah Art Museum (February-April 2009).
Edward Lear, Constantinople from Eyüp, 1858, Sir David Attenborough.
James Sant, Captain Colin Mackenzie, c1842/44, National Army Museum. |
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John Frederick Lewis, A Frank Encampment in the Desert of Mount Sinai, 1842/1856, © Yale Center for British Art, Paul Mellon Collection. |
