The Shrewsbury Arts Society Summer Event 2026

Cwm Weeg Gardens & House, Dolfor, Newtown, Powys, SY16 4AT

Wednesday 01 July 2026

 1.00pm to 6.00pm

We have great pleasure in inviting you to Cwm Weeg House & Gardens, a luxuriously landscaped Welsh garden with extensive borders covering 3 acres and set in over 37 acres of wonderful woodland and glorious wildflower meadows. The gardens include sculptures, fountains, moss garden and so much more.

You will have a unique opportunity to explore the 15th Century Farmhouse which is generously open to view by the owners, Wolfgang and Kingsley. This will include their extensive art collection of local artists consisting of sculpture and paintings by: Jane Hazelwood, Lucy Kinsella, Andrew Logan and Gill Tweed, Angus Eickoff, Colin See Paynton, Sarah Philpot, David Smith, Jenny Jones, Frances Carlile, Frieda Hughes, Victoria Gilliard, Angela Thorpe, Tim Phillips, Andrew Howe, Simon Dorrell, Anne Jenvy, Kaye Hodges to name but a few!!! Cwm Weeg is amongst the oldest inhabited dwellings in the Kerry/Dolfor area and stems from the late 15th Century, possibly built between 1460 - 1480.

Details of the Afternoon

Date: Wednesday 01 July 2026
Time: 1:00pm - 6:00pm
Venue: Cwm Weeg Gardens, Dolfor, Newtown, Powys, SY16 4AT
Coach: Departs Abbey Foregate Carpark at 1:00pm
Cost: £39 per head (Members)   £42 per head (Non-Members)

The afternoon starts with the coach leaving Abbey Foregate Car Park at 1:00pm, arriving at Cwm Weeg Gardens at approximately 1:45pm. Members are invited to explore the gardens and house before afternoon tea is served at 3:00pm in the garden pavilion. Afternoon tea will start with a glass of fizz, followed by sandwiches, savouries and homemade cake from our hosts. All served with tea / coffee. The coach will depart back to Shrewsbury at 5:30pm.

If you would like to attend, please contact Deborah Hyde via email on tassevents1@gmail.com with the information and payment as indicated below. Please contact her directly on her mobile, 07909 555 244, if you wish to send information or payment by post. Confirmation on receipt of payment will be sent by email.

The Closing Date to book your place is Saturday 20 June 2026. Please also advise of any food allergies or intolerances. Acknowledgement of your attendance will be via email. We regret that a refund is not possible after Monday 22 June 2026

We look forward to welcoming you and hope you can join us.

Please reserve ____________place(s) at £39.00 per head (members) or _________place(s) at £42.00 per head (non-members)

Please pay direct using an online banking to:- The Arts Society Shrewsbury

Account No: 00803405

Sort code: 20-77-85

Please state Summer Event alongside your surname as reference (so we can track your booking) OR Alternatively enclose a cheque made payable to The Arts Society, Shrewsbury and send to the address below.

Please remember to include a stamped self-addressed envelope, if you wish to receive written confirmation. Otherwise, confirmation will be sent by email.

Please give your name and guest’s names, and state any special dietary requirements. The Principal name will be responsible for all guests.

Name..............………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………..

Address…………………………………………………………………..............................................................................................................................................................................................................  Post Code ………………………

Telephone ...........................................   Email……………………………………………………………………………….

Dietary Requirements/Allergies ……………………………………………………………………………………………………………….

Names of Guests (Capitals Please)............................................................................................................................................................

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Guests Dietary Requirements/Allergies.…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………..

We regret that a refund is not possible after Monday 22 June 2026.

Please complete all your details and return this form to:

Mrs Deborah Hyde

Email: tassevents1@gmail.com

Mobile: 07909 555 244

Or by post:

 Pentre Cefn Hall, Craigllwyn, Nr. Oswestry, SY10 9BJ

The Arts Society Shrewsbury ran a Competition and Exhibition for Year 10 students accross Shropshire Schools to celebrate and enthuse young artistic talent accros Shropshire. 

You may have noticed The Shropshire magazine covered our event and we have submitted a report to The National arts Society Magazine, so fingers crossed we are included in the Autmn Issue.

As part of our support of young people we asked a Year 11 student, Grace Stanley, to do a write up of the event for our website which is below. 

Shropshire Students Shine

In May, Year 10 students from thirteen Shropshire schools and art enthusiasts from across the county gathered at Shrewsbury High School to view work at a new exhibition and crown a competition winner.

The Arts Society Shrewsbury have established a new competition in conjunction with Shrewsbury High School celebrating the work of local young artists in their first year of GCSE art.

The artists, whose work had been displayed in The Pavilion, arrived to view their pieces alongside the High Sheriff of Shropshire and His Majesty’s Lord-Lieutenant of Shropshire.

A huge array of talent and individuality was on display. Over 60 pieces of art in a wide-range of media and styles were showcased, meaning the final decision for the judges was not easy.

The overall winning piece titled ‘London City’ was a vibrant scene of a street, drawn using oil pastels. Hetty Grove, the winning artist, was inspired by the theme of construction and decided to use an urban scene of London. ‘My favourite part of the event was observing and learning about the unique themes behind the other pieces’ she said after the event.

In addition to the overall winner, two students were highly commended for their entries and Alex Jenner a photography student from Shrewsbury Sixth Form College, who took the pictures at the event was given photography materials from the Arts Society as a ‘thank you.’

The event was a great success and planning for a Year 12 competition this November is already underway.                                                                                         Grace Stanley

We were so pleased to once again support the bi-annual Bookfest art competition, which culminated in the presentation of the prizes at the Theatre Severn on 21st April. A lot of the schools attended the presentation and those that were not there were able to live stream it into their classrooms. As you can imagine each winner was greeted with much cheering and enthusiasm. The competition is open to all primary schools across Shropshire for young people in Years 5 and 6 and they could submit their work in the following categories – art, poetry, letters and film trailers. We sponsored the art category. We provided three judges to go through all the art submissions, the judges also had to read the books on the short list so that they had a better understanding of the work that was submitted. Judging was very difficult as the work was so good. A big thank you to Gloria Partridge, Blanche James and Gaynor Bowen for all their hard work!

The art work had to be a scene from one of the books and all the judges agreed the overall winner was Eleanor Kane from Pontesbury CE Primary School. All the prize winners have their art work displayed on the top floor of Theatre Severn. We really do recommend that you go andhave a look their work, it is amazing. You can also see them in our  Documents Store.

Tour of Suffolk 19th -24th April 2026

The sun had yet to burn through the early morning mists hanging low over the River Severn when our coach headed out to Suffolk for five days of beautiful April sunshine.

It wasn’t long before clutched Sunday newspapers were switched for guide books as we made our first stop at Ely cathedral. We admired the beautiful painted ceilings and learnt from the tour guides that the central wooden tower was erected after the original collapsed following building of the Lady Chapel.

Lucy had thoughtfully pre-arranged a hearty roast dinner for our party in the 13th century Undercroft, following which we were able to stroll around the walled garden and delight in the spring planting which included the first purple irises. We then returned to our coach for more chat (and post-prandial slumber) before heading on to the four star Angel Hotel in Bury St Edmunds for fine dining (and more slumber).

Monday found us split into three small groups for an intimate tour of Gainsborough’s House in Sudbury to learn more of Thomas. The youngest of nine children, his love of painting landscapes was cultivated from an early age but portraiture was more lucrative; he became a favourite painter with King George III but his real passion for capturing lighting effects within landscape was evident in the House tour. We admired the crinkle-crankle wall, medlar, quince, pear and mulberry trees in the garden, Thomas would almost certainly have known the latter.

Our driver, Chris, then took us the short distance to the glorious red-bricked Tudor Kentwell Hall where we enjoyed seeing the spring lambs, pigs and peacocks, all frolicking, basking and strutting around the stable yard environs as we took lunch. Displaying a unique blend of energy, optimism and enthusiasm, the owner Patrick Phillips explained he had bought the house semi-derelict with his wife Judith when he fell in love with it in 1970 and they have been renovating and maintaining it themselves ever since. Patrick took us on a fascinating personal tour around their moat (unusually brick-lined), dairy, bakery and brewhouse and adjacent gardens. He regaled us with many interesting historical facts as well as amusing anecdotes such as recently asking his wife to refrain from climbing ladders to clip the enormous topiary ‘Pied Piper’ yew hedge which she created and has clipped since its inception over 50 years ago. We were then generously allowed free roam of the interior rooms before it was time to head over to the neighbouring Holy Trinity church of Long Melford. This church was rebuilt in the 15th century at the height of Suffolk’s wool trade; the main benefactor was John Clopton (who also built early parts of Kentwell Hall) and was fortunate to have his life spared following his capture supporting the Lancastrian cause against King Edward IV. We saw fine medieval stained glass windows (including the Rabbit/Hare window symbolising the Trinity) and stumbled over the ancient Clopton brasses in crossing the threshold to cram into the Clopton Chantry containing the tomb of John and his family before heading out into the sunshine to enter the ancient Lady Chapel.

Tuesday started with fresh Easterly breezes and a short walking tour of the fine architecture to be seen in Bury St Edmunds including the smallest British pub (The Nutshell). Then through the Abbey gardens to a tour of St Edmundsbury Cathedral and a close encounter with a few of the ancient books (and their telltale woodworm) in the library which had initially been brought to Bury by Norfolk monks in 1020 and the collection amassed thereafter to further local instruction and intellect. We then visited Ickworth House for a walk around the grounds, its church with 14th century wall painting of Angel Gabriel and an excellent guided tour providing much insight into some of the paintings and their artists adorning the walls. The tour culminated at the splendid marble sculpture ‘The Fury of Athamas’ by John Flaxman (and for some of us, an irreverent peek at the mythical king’s endowment beneath an incongruous marble ‘modesty drape’ that the French had later added!). We returned to Bury just in time for a beautiful Evensong at the Cathedral which the choristers thoroughly appreciated.

After an early morning dash on Wednesday to view and sample wares and produce displayed along Bury’s Buttermarket, late morning was spent roaming the streets of tiny Lavenham nearby, with over 300 timber- framed houses; in the Guildhall the guide explained that it was both the rapid rise in prosperity through the wool trade and then a decline in fortunes that has led to the unique survival of these buildings. We luxuriated in the sunshine of the walled courtyard with clematis and scented lilac and perused the herb garden where we were shown rose madder and woad plants used in the wool-dyeing process. Then onto Ipswich’s Christchurch Mansion for a further history tour and where a member of our group, Richard, was able to meet his 23 times Great Grandmother’s oil portrait, one Mary Gooding (1600-1640) wearing Puritanical black robes and sporting symbolic jewellery. And yes, there was a likeness! The Wolsey Art Gallery yielded up an exhibition devoted to John Constable and some contemporary works by his descendant sculptor Sasha Constable.

Our trip was not yet over as Thursday saw us stopping off at the grand stately home, Boughton House (known as ‘The English Versailles’) near Kettering on the return leg, which was very kindly opened especially for our group and reparation works were even swept away the night before our visit. Delicious cooked lunch in the stables followed a thoroughly comprehensive (but chilly) tour of the house, the building of which was started by Ralph Montagu, English ambassador to France, extended by his son and re-invigorated two centuries later by the Duke of Buccleuch and Queensbury; numerous treasures were on offer including Sevres porcelain, rare pieces of furniture, tapestries and beautiful paintings of the aristocracy wearing sumptuous silks. We even had time to freely roam the gardens to see the lake and the woodland area before returning to Abbey Foregate.

There were many firsts for me on this trip as somehow Suffolk had bypassed me. I loved the flat landscape, the waterways, thatch and timber-framed buildings alike and the Suffolk welcome - one local couple in Lavenham with whom we shared a lunch table, told us not to worry if we missed the coach as they would happily drive us themselves back to the Angel!

This was also the first time for me on an Arts Society holiday trip and it was lovely to meet and chat to like-minded individuals, everyone was so kind and made an effort to be inclusive.

But overwhelmingly it was also a time for re-awakening appreciation of arts and history through the excellent guided tours and thoughtful itinerary; the day after we returned from Suffolk I had cause to travel to London and felt inspired to book an extra night at the hotel in order to visit the Courtauld Gallery (taking in the two Cassoni covered by 2025 TASS talk while I was there!) and on my way back home it felt fitting to return to Waddesdon Manor.

We are all so very grateful to Lucy for her time and efforts in curating and organising this trip and also to Nichola and Deborah for their support too. I very much look forward to next year’s trip.

We are looking forward to welcoming you once again to our Christmas lunch on Wednesday 3rd December 2025.  Coffee or tea will be served from 10.15am giving everyone the opportunity to be seated ahead of the lecture starting at 11am on The Twelve Plants of Christmas from Timothy Walker. You will also have the opportunity to purchase raffle tickets and are grateful for your continued and generous support of the Young Arts.

There will be a seating plan for lunch, and your menu choice will be on your name card.  Tables will be a maximum of ten people: you may make up your own table of ten or request to be seated with others.  Please make this clear on your application form and we will do our best to accommodate your request but cannot promise.
 
Please return your form and menu choices (attached), with all the details completed, the deadline is Friday 21st November 2025.  

Deborah Hyde will be taking bookings before and after the lecture on Wednesday 15th October 2025 where forms will be available.

Acknowledgement will be by e-mail.  If you require a written receipt, please enclose a stamped addressed envelope. Please note forms received after Friday 21st November 2025 cannot be accepted.

Any cancellations or menu changes cannot be made after this date. Full assistance with swapping with anyone on the waiting list will be given.

Wednesday 3rd December 2025

Menu

Main Course

Roast Shropshire Turkey Breast, Cranberry Stuffing, Pigs in Blankets served with a Rich Turkey Gravy

*

Fillet of Salmon with a Lemon & Basil Crumb, Fried Samphire and  Seafood & Chardonnay Velouté

*

Red Onion & Goats Cheese Tart

*

All served with a selection of Seasonal Vegetables and Roast Potatoes

Desserts

Steamed Traditional Christmas Pudding with Hot Brandy Sauce

*

Mixed Berry Pavlova, Amaretti Biscuit & Fruit Coulis

*

Poached Pear with Crumble & Vegan Coconut Ice Cream (Vegan & G/F)

*

Followed by tea or coffee and minced pies.  
 
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A drink is included with every meal, either a glass of wine or a glass of orange or apple juice.

£37.00 per person. Please note, the price includes tea or coffee ahead of the lecture, a tip for the waiting staff and a glass of wine, or juice to be chosen on the day. 

Please find the booking form in the Documents Store.

Chairman’s Newsletter August 2025

28th August 2025   

Dear Members

I hope you have had a good summer and have been able to enjoy all the wondrous festivals and outdoor theatre that Shropshire has to offer. Of course, the weather this year has been amazing, I hope you haven’t all boiled too much!!

It is at a time like this when I look back over almost  three years as your chairman, I don’t know where the time has gone and I feel proud to have served you and can’t believe I am approaching the end of my tenure in October. But all I can say is haven’t we had a ball?  And we will continue to do so as The Arts Society Shrewsbury goes from strength to strength!!

We enjoyed an amazing Summer Event at Vaynor Park on 1st July, royally entertained by William & Kate Corbett Winder along with a fascinating talk by Jeremy Rye. It was so kind of them to open their very private home and garden to us all.

 As a thank you to the committee Marcus & I entertained them and their partners to a summer lunch the week after, the weather treated us kindly in fact I think the only complaint was not enough shade!!

We have had a good response for our visit to The Silk Museum in Macclesfield, taking place on 25th September, there are still about 8 or so places left so be quick if you don’t want to miss out. It looks as if it will be a good day out, the coach is meeting us at Abbey Foregate as usual. The day includes a guided tour of both The Silk Museum and Paradise Mill along with time in Macclesfield to enjoy a lunch at a wide choice of restaurants. Please contact Linda Ferguson to snap up those last few places on lindakferg@gmail.com

 I hope you have had time to check out our 2026 programme, it is up on our website, it looks as if it is going to live up to all expectations, with the usual vast array of subjects and some very renowned lecturers. If you haven’t had a chance then check it out!! https://www.theartssocietyshrewsbury.org.uk/Lectures/FutureLectures.aspx

Lizzie Spear has worked really hard over the summer, filling 250 Arts Society Bags  full of art and craft materials for all different ages and has delivered them to the Food Bank in Shrewsbury. The staff there were so grateful and have spent the summer distributing them. Most of the bags had been distributed by the first week in August with just some of the ones for older children still to be handed out.

One client commented “my daughter is doing GCSE Art and will really appreciate having [these] to do some work over the summer.”

It is so nice to feel we are really supporting the less fortunate youngsters of Shrewsbury.

 I ran the West Midlands Area Membership workshop on 24th June for 5 societies in the West Midlands who were struggling to build their membership or recruit committee members,  the whole day was very well received. As always, I used Shrewsbury as a Society to aspire to!!

 Well, our Event we holding in conjunction with The Arts Society Wrekin at Cound Church on 10th September has been a sell out. We are very much looking forward to listening to John Vigar, a renowned Arts Society Lecturer, talk to us about “Murder Sex & Mayhem in our English Churches” Maybe that iswhy it has sold so well!! What does it say about Shrewsbury & Wrekin members!!

This will be followed by some excellent tea and cake kindly provided for us by Cound Parochial Council.

 And finally, as we approach the beginning of our new year I will be sending out our renewal forms on 1st September. Unfortunately, we have not escaped the pressures of price increases. The stadium raised their prices in January, the lecturers fees have increased along with their travel expenses as the year has progressed which has put pressure on our current year’s finances. As you know, we attempt to breakeven using the subscription price to cover the cost of the 10 lectures we hold each year and the related expenses. Several societies use other events and raffles to raise money to cover these standard costs, but I feel Shropshire benefits hugely from us using the money raised in our raffles to support young arts and community arts projects. Hence, we are forced to increase our annual subscription to £69 for 2025/26. Even with this rise and the current number of members, the budget still shows a shortfall,  but one we think we can live with. 

To be honest I still see this as a bargain price of £6.90 per lecture, where else could you meet up with your friends, be entertained by a professional lecturer and enhance your knowledge on such a variety of topics, as well as be part of a high profile organisation that does so much good in the community. You should all be proud to be a member of such a society.

 The letter will go out on 1st September, I implore you not to pay your subscription before that as our year end is 31st August and I will get shot by Helen Mardell, our treasurer, whose life will be so much easier if all the subscriptions arrive in the correct year!!

 I look forward to seeing you on 10th September at Cound and 17th September at our first lecture on the Antiques Market.

In the meantime I hope you enjoy the last few weeks of your summer break. .

Best wishes
Lucy

Lucy Harvey-Scholes
lucy@harveyscholes.co.uk

Chairman

The Arts Society Shrewsbury
 

Chairman’s Newsletter June 2025

 9th June 2025          

Dear Members

It was so good to see so many of you at our last lecture in May, and now it is already a month later. Where does the time go.

I spent a very enjoyable evening in Bridgnorth at St Mary’s Church on Wednesday at The Haydn Festival where amongst other orchestral pieces, Crispin Steele Perkins gave us a wonderful rendition of Handel’s Trumpet Concerto. Aren’t we lucky that Shropshire is home to so many wonderful festivals which attract first class musicians. I am heading over there again tonight to hear the most wonderful cellist Pavel Serbin play Haydn’s 1st Cello concerto, my absolute favourite. The festival is on until Sunday and I’m sure there are still tickets left. https://www.englishhaydn.com/HaydnLeaflet--2025.pdf

 Summer Event at Vaynor Park Tuesday 1st July 2025

 We have under 10 spaces left on our summer event at Vaynor Park. We are very grateful to Willam & Kate Corbett Winder, who as a favour to me, are allowing us access to their personal  Modern Art collection along with their garden. They are generously donating the whole of their £35 per head fee to charity, the extra amount we are paying is covering the catering.  Jeremy Rye an renowned local art historian who worked for Sotherby’s for over 20 years and who has a passion for heritage and old buildings has agreed to give us a talk about the architecture of Vaynor Park.

If you would loke to snap up those last places then please contact Deborah Hyde to book your place  LOMSLondon@btconnect.com

If you would like to know more about Vaynor Park please follow the link here. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vaynor_Park

 2026 Programme

As a committee we have now agreed our programme of lectures for 2026 which will be up on the website shortly. We have an amaziong array of subjects and all the lecturers have been rated outstanding by other Arts Societies. My thanks go to

 Nichola Dapling & Gloria Partridge who have worked tirelessly developing this programme and amending timings when lecturers can’t make the relevant dates allocated to them!! I remember my time well of being programme secretary and it is no mean task getting the right mix of subjects in the right order!!

 Volunteering Opportunities at Shrewsbury Castle

Shrewsbury Castle are looking for volunteers for a new medal project they are launching. Volunteers will be working in groups of 2-3 alongside experienced volunteers.

The work will involve :-

1.Audit, photograph and prepare medals for display in context of the

Museum‘s medal collection,

2.Duration, 6-9 months, ideally 2-3 days a week, but flexible by negotiation, groups of 2-3 volunteers at a time, who could work at different stages of the Project

3.Arts Society members are valued for their experience, expertise, and commitment, and would work under the guidance of an experienced volunteer

4.Not all skills are required or would be expected from each volunteer, a mix is needed. Briefly, any one of the following skills would be valued, cataloguing: photography: interest or some knowledge of local history: IT design: presentation and/or production experience, all contributing to the final medal display

This gives us all the opportunity to  join up with friends, or make new ones in TASS, whilst making a significant contribution to our heritage here in Shropshire.

To find out more about this project please contact Ann Furness  atfurness@googlemail.com

Doom Painting Tea & Talk Cound Church Wednesday 10th September 2025

Booking details will be circulated in the next few weeks to book your place for this lecture. All ticket sales will be donated to the Doom Painting Appeal at Cound Church.

 Art Bags

We were successful in our bid for a grant from The Arts Society to match fund our art Bags Project. We are in the process of  putting together these Art Bags for children which will be distributed via the food bank in Shrewsbury over the summer holidays.

 Arts Society Trustees

The Arts Society trustee board are looking for two new Trustees to join the board at the AGM in September, please contact me if any of you are interested. The Deadline for submissions is  7th July  2025.

 West Midlands Membership Workshop

I will be running this workshop on 24th June 2025, we have 5 societies signed up for the day where we will sharing best practice and ideas involving, running a good monthly lecture & committee meeting along with membership and committee  recruitment. I will be assisted by members of the West Midlands Committee and Joe Little from Head office.

I very much look forward to seeing you next Wednesday for our lecture on Ravenna.

 In the meantime I hope you have a lovely weekend.

 Best wishes
 

Lucy

Lucy Harvey-Scholes
lucy@harveyscholes.co.uk

Chairman:-The Arts Society Shrewsbury
 

On the 14th November 36 of our nenmbers and guests had a wonderfuk tour of the Shrewsbury Flaxmill and Maltings.  This is a major historic site in Shrewsbury that has recently undergone a 9 year restoration project.

It was a beuatiful day, warm and sunny for November.  Our three guides; Micheal, Rob and Christine tooks us on a facinating 90 minute tour of the site and buildings.  It was their enthusasim and knowledge that brought it all to life.

After the tour we had free time to enjoy The Mill Exhibit in the main building and coffee/tea and snacks in the Turned Wood Cafe on site.

Traditional Afternoon Tea 2.30 for 3pm
 

We have great pleasure in inviting you to join us at this year’s  Summer Event  at Hawkstone Park. We have secured the ballroom for traditional afternoon tea and will then have time to explore the gardens. 

This will be a wonderful chance for us all to get together and relax in a really wonderful setting. 

Afternoon Tea
A selection of delicate finger sandwiches, Cakes, Freshly Baked Plain & Fruit Scones, Specially Selected Teas & Coffees  
£32.95 per person. 
 

If you would like to attend, please print and complete the application form you will find Documents Store  and return it to  by email or post to:
Mrs Deborah Hyde, Pentre Cefn Hall, Craigllwyn, Nr. Owestry, SY10 9BJ. Email: LOMSLondon@btconnect.com. / Mobile 07909 555 244

17th August 2024

Dear Members

At last a chance for me to get down to usual Arts Society business, so here is my summer newsletter.
 
It was lovely to see so many of you yesterday at our artists’ studio visit. What a contrast, spending  time in a forge watching William work  to sitting in Frieda’s comfortable home listening to her tell us about her art and treat us to an insightful poetry reading.
 
The new year is about to begin, and I thought I should let you know of a couple of things we have planned on top of our monthly lectures.
 
We are organising an extra Day of Special Interest this Autumn on Thursday 31st October 2024. I thought you might like to put it in your diary. We are looking forward to welcoming Dr Caroline Shenton to Shrewsbury who will be covering the history, art and architecture of the Houses of Parliament: 1,000 years of a British Icon. Details can be found on our website please follow the link https://www.theartssocietyshrewsbury.org.uk/Special/FutureSpecial.aspx.
Booking Forms will be sent out the first week in September. 
 
Secondly, I am leading a four night tour to Kent & Sussex next spring leaving Shrewsbury 28th April 2025. We will be staying in Tunbridge Wells, I am just finalising the details with Success Tours (who led our trip to Somerset last June), I will be circulating the details soon.  
 
Subscriptions are due for the current year on September 1st. We are freezing the subscription price this year, it will remain at £65 representing only £6.50 per lecture. Renewal details will be coming out next week. Please could you ensure you send us your address and phone numbers, along with your renewals, we are trying to ensure our database is completely up to date. We became acutely aware that we didn’t have contact details for everyone last June when Shrewsbury Castle cancelled our tour the night before.
 
I am in London this week representing The Arts Society Shrewsbury at The Arts Society AGM, which is taking place on Friday 23rd August. I have voted on Shrewsbury’s behalf for 5 new trustees, the successful candidates will be announced at this meeting. To keep you up to date, 9 of the 10 current trustees are resigning at this meeting as a result of losing the vote at the EGM to change the governance of the society. Roly Trevor Jones who has served as a trustee for 4 years is one of those standing down. I think we have all appreciated having a representative from The Arts Society Shrewsbury on the board and I would like to express our thanks for her sterling work.  I attach a letter from her at the end of this email.

I received an email last night to inform societies that both Florian Schweizer (CEO) & Tim Nicholls’ (COO) will be stepping down from their positions on 23rd August 2024.  I am surprised at the speed of their departure, and I am concerned about the difficulties that might arise not allowing adequate time for a smooth handover.
 
So it seems we enter a new chapter after the AGM. I spoke to several of the prospective trustees earlier in the summer as a means of assessing who Shrewsbury should vote for and I was greatly encouraged. I was impressed generally by their commitment to restoring trust in Head Office. Several of them explained their desire to ensure the trustee board was more open & transparent and stressed the importance of working closely and consulting regularly with the member societies. I wish them well in their new role.
 
The future for The Arts Society looks bright.

I look forward to seeing you in September at Hawkstone Hall on 13th September and at our lecture at The Shropshire Conference Centre on 18th September

I hope you have a lovely bank holiday weekend. 

Best wishes

Lucy

Lucy Harvey-Scholes
lucy@harveyscholes.co.uk
Chairman
The Arts Society Shrewsbury
07971 608880
 

We left Shrewsbury at 8 o’clock on a clear Monday morning in excited anticipation of our few days to be spent in Somerset. On our way we stopped at Berkeley Castle, one of the Marche castles built to keep out the Welsh. After a coffee we split into two groups and had a fascinating private tour. One of the oldest families in Britain, dating back from Saxon times, The Berkeleys, still reside here today. It was so interesting to learn both about the history and also to understand how they were managing to keep the castle under private ownership by utilising the space for weddings and other private functions.

We motored on to the beautiful town of Wells arriving early evening at The Swan Hotel which was situated right opposite the cathedral where we settled in for a few days.

The next morning, we made our way to the cathedral for an extremely enjoyable and informative tour. The Cathedral is seen by some, as Europe’s first truly gothic structure. Unusually for a building of monastic foundation many secular buildings still remain allowing us to follow on with a further private guided tour of the Bishop’s Palace and gardens. This remains today the seat of the Bishop of Bath & Wells. I think all of us there will agree that Wells is one of the most beautiful cathedral cities in England and we felt lucky to be staying so close to the Cathedral.

After lunch we headed to Shepton Mallet to visit a fascinating private family home Old Bowlish House. Of Jacobean origin the house and its’ owners have had a chequered history from being fined in the English civil war to periods of both bankruptcy and sustained wealth. The present owners have carefully renovated both the house and gardens researching its history, we benefitted from both their knowledge and love it all.  They also have an amazing contemporary collection of art, ceramics and glass and antique furniture. If that wasn’t enough the afternoon was rounded off with the most wonderful tea with scrumptious home-made biscuits. We returned to Wells just in time to regroup where many of us returned to Wells cathedral evensong, for me, there is nothing more mesmerising than letting the music of evensong waft across the quire. So ethereal and contemplative.

The next morning, we headed to Forde Abbey a former monastery turned into a family home in the 17th century. It was a privilege to be allowed into the house prior to opening for a fascinating tour including some of the family’s private apartments and the famous Mortlake tapestries. We delayed our departure by half an hour to allow us to wander round the garden or relax in the café with a well-earned coffee and homemade cake. I think most of us managed to view the highest-powered fountain in the country which erupted at 12.30.

Our next stop was at Stourhead, where we spent over 3 hours leisurely exploring the house and gardens. The entrance hall of the house housed the Hoare family portraits, one of the guides took some of us through the family history giving us a structure to understand the rest of the house. The gardens, the brainchild of Henry Hoare “The Magnificent”, a visionary 18th century gentleman gardener, were incredible. As you walked around the lake you moved from panorama to panorama each one designed precisely for the viewers’ enjoyment. Jane (one of our group) had produced a potted history of the gardens prior to our visit which greatly enhanced our experience.   

On our way home we stopped  in Bath for a blue badge guided tour, followed by a couple of hours of free time to lunch, shop or visit galleries.

We returned to Shrewsbury both inspired and exhausted, there is so much to see and so little time on these trips, but many of us I know, are planning a return trip to revisit favourites at a more leisurely pace!

Dear Members

I thought it was about time I sent you all another newsletter, so much seems to be happening.  I started writing this over the bank holiday weekend but it is now well into the following week! I hope you are all enjoying this wonderful weather and are manging to get on top of your gardens. Marcus & I are off to Edinburg to a wedding tomorrow, hopefully the weather will be as good in Scotland.

Proposed Governance Changes

As I mentioned in my last email, the EGM scheduled for 15th April was cancelled and a new date has been set for 3rd June. On this date we will be asked to vote on whether or not to accept the proposed governance changes. The committee met on 12th April and debated the revised articles of association that were issued on 25th March. The committee acknowledged the revisions that had been made from the first draft and were pleased to see that some of the issues had been addressed. However, we still felt that the articles were very poorly drafted, they contained many typos and anomalies and were still proposing to disenfranchise the members, by excluding the membership from any influence over future decisions that the Arts Society might make. We are not against change: within our own society we are always looking at ways to improve and expand our society. We have embraced the expansion to cultur.art.

The committee remain firmly of the opinion the proposed changes in governance do not need to be implemented for the Arts Society to expand their horizons as they intend and meet their charitable objectives through other means, in addition to local societies.  We have yet to have sight of the document presented to the trustees explaining why these changes were required. In conclusion the committee have endorsed the decision to oppose the changes and I will accordingly vote against the motion on behalf of The Arts Society Shrewsbury at the EGM on 3rd June.

We feel the way forward would be to encourage members who have the relevant skills to put themselves forward for election to the national trustee board.  Four trustee places are up for election at the AGM in August and I will be working with my fellow chairmen across the country to encourage members with a variety of skills to stand for election.

Culur.art

I thought some of you would be interested in seeing the new venture sponsored by The Arts Society, please pass this on to friends and also your children or and grandchildren as the content is designed with the younger generation in mind.

If you search on line for Cultur.art

You will find

- bite sized content on Instagram

- the written word on Substack, this is also linked from Instagram.

Or alternatively search on TikTok

I have looked at the first two options and it is certainly interesting, I don’t have a tiktok account and nor does it seem, do my children, so I haven’t been able to check that one out.

I think this is all very exciting and interesting and I hope it attracts a younger audience as desired. My only slight concern was to find no connection or accreditation to The Arts Society on the content. Maybe I missed it!

Do let me know what you think and I can hand this feedback to head office.

Cultural Arts Investigators: -The Hive

Deborah Hyde and Linda Ferguson spent a very enjoyable afternoon last Saturday at The Hive. You may remember we have sponsored a Cultural Investigators Exhibition.

This project is about recognition, celebration, and promotion of local culture amongst young people in Shropshire, Telford & Wrekin. Working with young people aged 5 – 18, they explore the artistic and cultural inspiration that The Hive has provided over the years and use this, alongside a choice of exciting creative opportunities to engage young people in realising the potential for their own cultural futures. The young people become researchers, learners practitioners, performers and curators.

Deborah & Linda said, “It was so encouraging to see young people enthused, proud and engaged with the arts and The Hive. It is clearly a lifeline for some.  They were totally engaged with the story There are a number of small exhibits with a journey through the studio to include photography, paintings, calligraphy and story telling

I do hope many of you will be able to visit the exhibition, we were made very welcome and they were clearly pleased that we had come on the opening day.

Bookfest

Shrewsbury Theatre Severn hosted the Bookfest awards ceremony as usual on Tuesday 30th April. As always, we had sponsored the art competition, we provided judges from our society and art boxes as prizes. I would like to thank Gloria Partridge, Blanche James & Gaynor Bowen for giving up their time, not only judging the artwork,  but also reading the 6 books the bookfest had shortlisted for their award, to allow them to understand the art submitted. I am told they had a very enjoyable day and thought the standard of art was extremely thoughtful and good.  This is an extremely worthwhile charity to support, I am in awe of the hard work the trustees and volunteers of Bookfest spend inspiring young readers and schools to get involved, they all appear continually with an enthusiastic smile. The showcase event at Theatre Severn was a triumph. I felt proud that we were able to contribute our small part to the project.

I would like to thank Gloria Partridge for all the work she has done coordinatint the support for these projects on our behalf.

Visits

Many of you attended the visit to Weston Park at the beginning of April and I know a lot of you have signed up for the second visit on 3rd June. There are still a few places left if you would like to join the visit. Please contact Linda Ferguson at lindakferg@gmail.com

We are heading to Arbury Hall on 25th June, booking information will be coming out in the next few days. Watch this space, Linda will also be taking bookings at the next lecture.

Somerset Tour

We are ever approaching our trip to Somerset, I can’t believe it has come around so quickly and it is only a few weeks away. I will be sending out an email soon directly to those attending and you should be receiving an information pack from Success Tours next week as well. I am very much looking forward to it and I know we will have lots of fun.

I very much ook forward to seeing many of you next week at our lecture on Elizabethan Houses.

Best wishes

Lucy

Lucy Harvey-Scholes
lucy@harveyscholes.co.uk
Chairman
The Arts Society Shrewsbury
07971 608880

Dear Members
 
Well, it has been a busy month, thank you all for your comments on the governance proposals, I apologise if I haven’t acknowledged yours, I have read them all but have not had a chance to  respond to you all individually. I really appreciate the time you have spent looking into this and going through the various documents, the reassuring thing is we are all coming up with similar concerns. Who said governance couldn’t be fascinating!

Proposed Governance Changes Update
Jill & I have attended zoom drop-in sessions organised by the Arts Society, I have had endless discussions with other chairman and members and committee members of other societies. We also attended the West Midlands Area committee meeting on Thursday where Tony Strachan, the trustee who headed up the governance reform committee was with us to answer our questions. This meeting was very useful as it gathered together almost all of the chairman in the West Midlands Area, allowing us to bring our concerns to the table. Tony was very helpful even though he didn’t necessarily agree with us all the time. He had been to several similar area meetings and did say that similar concerns were being raised at all those meetings.

Prior to this meeting we fed back to head office our shared concerns about lack of representation and accountability. We have struggled to understand the trustees’ argument on conflict of interest but have made our viewpoint clear. We have also stressed our concern about the lack of time to consult and  the need to rush these changes through so quickly. It is better to get it right even if it takes time.

Overall, though, the opinion seems to be this is not a well drafted document, articles of association are meant to be written in such a way that allows the charity or company to operate but not restrict them too much. These articles are quite restrictive in certain areas and are silent in others that are important.

In summary the trustees have agreed to issue an amended document on 25th March 2024 taking on board some of our concerns. This is encouraging and we await the document with anticipation. How much of a rewrite can be done in the limited time prescribed is questionable.

As a committee we will be discussing the issue on Wednesday morning and deciding, in principle, whether we support the proposal or not. If we decide not to support the proposal, we will review our decision in the light of the document issued on the 25th March and have a further meeting to make our final decision sometime before the EGM on 15th April.
 

Visits
Linda Ferguson has been working hard sorting out a programme of visits. The first one being to  Weston Park which is coming up on 4th April. We have a large waiting list so we are organising a second trip, date to be confirmed after our meeting on Wednesday.  Those of you on the waiting list, will have first refusal on the day, so I hope you will be able to make the next date.
The other trips we have scheduled are as follows:

Tuesday 25th June 2024        Visit to Arbury Hall

July (Date to be confirmed).    Visit to The Mount House Darwin’s Birthplace  

September (Date to be confirmed).     Visit to two Artists’ Studios in Mid Wales:- William O’Brien, architectural blacksmith & Frieda Hughes, artist & poet. 


Young Arts
Gloria Partridge has been working very hard seeking out projects for us to support this year with our raffle proceeds. You may remember last year we supported The Shropshire Music Trust allowing them to set up a choir, which is still going, The John Weaver Festival of Dance, and an art workshop at The Hive. We try and spread our sponsorship across all manner of Arts projects, and it is always fun to see what is on offer.

This year we are supporting The Art Competition at the 2024 Bookfest. Many of you will know what an amazing job this charity does to encourage reading in schools. We have been involved since the inception of The Art Competition and are continuing our support this year. The students are encouraged to submit their entries based on one of the 6 books which have been shortlisted for them to read. We provide three judges to enhance the panel along with supplying art boxes as prizes for first second and third place in each school. These paintings are being judged in the next few weeks and they are holding a large presentation in Shrewsbury theatre where the prizes will be presented at the end of April.

We have been so impressed with the way The Hive works and continues to come up with innovative Arts projects for youngsters in Shrewsbury.  This year they approached us to sponsor an exhibition which has been organised and curated by young people. It is about recognition, celebration, and promotion of local culture amongst young people aged between 5-18. The exhibition will be taking place on Saturday 20th April and all members are invited to go along.

Gloria is also in discussions with Jess Richards who is founder of The Shrewsbury Arts Trail to see what project we could get involved with in this year’s trail,  primarily targeting youngsters. We will keep you informed.

It is so wonderful to see how we can enhance young people’s Arts’ opportunities within the community by supporting these varied projects.  

Day of Special Interest
Moving on to more exciting things, we had an a really uplifting Day of Special Interest on 7th March. Dr John Stevens made his first ever trip up to Shropshire to share his knowledge of India, Bangladesh, the Empire, Calcutta and last, but not least, Rabindranath Tagore. It was a brilliantly choreographed day and sparked our thirst for more knowledge! We will look to book him sometime in the future for a lecture.

Programme Secretaries
Jill Robinson & Nichola Dapling spent this weekend in London attending the Directory Day. This is a day organised by Head Office which gathers together most of the accredited lecturers allowing them to give either 2 or 1 minute presentations. It is a mesmerising day but one that is extremely useful for highlighting good lecturers. By the end of it you feel totally exhausted but uplifted! Our thanks go to Jill & Nichola for giving up their weekend to head down to Westminster.

I look forward to seeing you all on Wednesday to hear about Bauhaus, the German art school that had a profound influence on  subsequent developments in art architecture, graphic design, interior design, and many other areas.
As a reminder Gavin Plumley is not allowing us to zoom this lecture so it is in person only. 

Best wishes
 
Lucy
 
Lucy Harvey-Scholes
Chairman
The Arts Society Shrewsbury
lucy@harveyscholes.co.uk
07971 608880

The Shrewsbury Art Society’s Christmas Lunch on the 06 December 2023 started with Sandy Burnett introducing us to Christmas in Bach’s Leipzig: The Christmas Oratorio 1734/5 which was the perfect start to our celebration of Christmas and another year together as a society.

It was so nice to welcome 132 members and guests who joined us to enjoy a three-course meal together with our speaker and our honoured guest Mandy Thorn, Shropshire’s High Sheriff. Mandy spent time circulating with us all during the break and showed an enthusiastic interest in our society and the work we do. It was wonderful to hear the room filled with laughter giving everyone the opportunity to talk and relax for a few hours. Our chairman, Lucy Harvey Scholes, expertly ran the raffle raising over £400 which will go towards supporting Young Arts projects around Shropshire. We are really grateful to all of our members for suppporting this cause so generously, not only at this Christmas lunch, but also on a monthly basis.

Our bus with 32 on board headed off to Walsall to visit the New Art Gallery and the Leather Museum. 

After refreshments in the Art Gallery, Julie our guide, gave us a very succinct overview of the Garman Ryan collection gifted to Walsall by Kathleen Garman, widow of Jacob Epstein and her lifelong artist friend, Sally Ryan. This very varied collection of sculptures and artworks has been tastefully arranged in themes to create an intimate house setting and Julie picked out several special works to discuss with us. 

After this, we did a 10 minute walk to the nearby Leather Museum. Walsall was a worldwide centre of the leather industry and still has the distinction of making handbags for royalty and the late Queen reputedly owned 200 of them. Some of the best saddles, bridles and related leather items came from Walsall to be sent all over the world. The museum is housed in an old factory building and some of the staff had themselves worked in the leather industry.

It is now time to renew our membership, we have an exciting programme of lectures planned begining on 20th September when we welcome Simon Seligman to our society to tell us "How Joseph Paxton Came to Put The World Under Glass"

Further deatils of our lectures, up until Christmas 2024, can be found in the lectures section of our website by following the link below

https://www.theartssocietyshrewsbury.org.uk/Lectures/FutureLectures.aspx

It is easy, whether you are renewing your membership or joining us for the first time, just follow the link below for all the details. 

https://www.theartssocietyshrewsbury.org.uk/DocumentStore/Membership%20form%202023-%202024.pdf

We look forward to seeing on 20th September, lectures start promptly as 2pm

Report on Summer Event to Bryngwyn Hall

It was a sultry summer afternoon when 58 of us had the pleasure of a private tour of Bryngwyn Hall and gardens followed by a drinks and canapés reception.

Auriol The Marchioness of Linlithgow welcomed us to her family home and gave us  an introductory talk about the history of her family and Bryngwyn going back 200 years. We then divided into 2 groups for a more detailed tour of the house and garden.

Auriol enthralled us as we were shown around the house with amusing stories of her ancestors' antics and origins of much of the furniture and pictures.

 Ruth, the head gardener, gave us an inspirational tour of the large landscaped garden with its beautiful borders, historic trees, and views of the glorious 9 acre lake. 

The visit was rounded off with a wonderful drinks and canape reception in the main hall.

A delightful afternoon in a stunning and historic landscape.

SUMMER EVENT AT

BRYNGWYN HALL

 LLANFYLLIN POWYS SY22 5LJ

SUNDAY 11TH June 2023

House and Garden Tours start at 3pm

We have great pleasure in inviting you to join us at this year’s  Summer Event  at Bryngwyn Hall, the historic home of Auriol Marchioness of Linlithgow.

The historic privately owned Bryngwyn Hall listed grade II* has been in Lady Linlithgow’s family for over 200 years. The house and garden fell into dereliction from the 1930's until the restoration programme started in 1989. Wonderful mature trees and shrubs remain from earlier planting.

Located on the Shropshire/Powys border, Bryngwyn Hall stands in nine acres of award-winning gardens complete with an eight acre lake, surrounded by sixty acres of oak studded parkland designed in the manner of William Emes (1730 - 1803) in the late 18c.

We will be able to enjoy private tours of both the house and garden followed by a drinks and canapé reception in the historic surroundings. Tea, coffee and soft drinks will also be available if preferred.

The tours will start promptly at 3pm so please arrive in good time. The address is Bryngwyn Hall Bwlch-y-Ciabau. Llanfyllin. Powys SY22 5LJ

Car parking is available in the park with disabled parking close to the house. Please let me know on booking if you require a disabled space. The Hall is approximately 30 minutes’ drive from the centre of Shrewsbury.

For more information about Bryngwyn and Lady Linlithgow do visit their website.

Visit www.bryngwyn.com/

If you would like to attend, please print and complete the application form below or if easier from our website  Documents Store and return it to Nichola Dapling by email or post.

Payment can be made either by cheque, or bank transfer. Alternatively printed forms will be available at our March meeting for you to complete and hand in on the spot, together with your cheque.

Our group of 20 visited Abberley Hall in Worcestershire on a glorious sunny warm day. 

This grade 2 listed building has been a prep school for over a century and sadly, the school is closing at the end of the current term.

Jo, our guide round the property was informative and entertaining - she had been a parent and governor of the school and had researched the history and architecture of the building about which she obviously had a wealth of inside knowledge. 

After an excellent tea and cakes, quite a few of us clambered up the Clock Tower built in 1883. The view from the top embraces 6 counties. 

We met the bus at 07.00hrs at Abbey Foregate, making good progress to Dumfries House. The house and it’s precious contents were saved for the nation with much help from the Prince of Wales - now King Charles. As one would expect, there were shortbread biscuits and the tea was served in china cups and saucers. The guides to the house were superb as were the gardens - time was limited but one could spend a whole day there and still not see everything. 

Next stop was our hotel near Helensburgh which is on the shores of the Firth of Clyde. We were looked after  very well. Our dinner choices were noted on the previous evening so remembering what we had ordered the next evening was quite a challenge - for some of us!

We learned quite a lot about the architect Rennie Mackintosh and his artistic wife, Margaret. 

We visited The House of an Art Lover which they had designed but had never seen finished. This Art Nouveau house was designed for a competition in 1901 but not built until more than 80 years later. The same day we visited Hill House, the family home of Walter Blackie of publishing fame, who, in 1902, had commissioned Rennie and Margaret to design the house, furniture and textiles. 

The following day we visited the amazing Kelvingrove Art Gallery and Museum in Glasgow and the Hunterian Museum - we self guided around both and some made their way to the Mackintosh House which is a reassemblage of their own house and tells the story of their lives. 

On our last full day in Glasgow, we visited the Burrell Collection with its 9000 works of art and one of the greatest collections created by one person and gifted to the city. 

On our way back to Shrewsbury, we stopped off at Levens Hall near Kendal for a guided tour round the house after which the head gardener, took us for a comprehensive and entertaining tour around the wonderful garden with its famous topiary. 

Newsletter March 2023

13th March 2023

Dear Members

Just when we all thought spring was in the air the snow arrives! It was a wonderful sight last Thursday morning when I woke up, a beautiful white blanket covering the rolling hills. I know that everyone doesn’t agree with me, but I love snow, although I did feel sorry for the poor daffodils fighting to get their heads above the white blanket. Definitely better than the deluge of tain this morning

I was in London just after the last meeting  visiting my sister and ended up with  a bit of an Art extravaganza . I was lucky enough to visit the Cezanne exhibition before it closed  I’m sure many of you have been, wasn’t it wonderful to see so many of his pieces of art in one place. Too much to take in at one sitting, I wish there had been time to go back.

The next day we went to see the Donatello exhibition which is on at the V & A. I am in awe of a sculptor, the skill involved with enabling these masterpieces to emerge from the stone, or bronze. I love the folds of the clothes, it’s hard to believe they aren’t cloth. This is on until June, it is definitely worth a visit. We also went to see the Estorick Collection where they were holding an exhibition of Morandi’s work which one of you kindly recommended at the last meeting, it was wonderful thank you.

We are looking forward to our next lecture on Morocco Blues next week, I hope you will be able to make it. We are aware that the lunches were not great last month, the staff apologise for this, unfortunately their chef was taken ill, and everything was slightly awry. They assure me that normal service will be resumed this month.

Day of Special Interest

There are still a few places left on our study day exploring the Fine Art of British Exploration, please contact Pippa Walker if you would like to join us on 29th March. There is further information on our website https://www.theartssocietyshrewsbury.org.uk/Special/FutureSpecial.aspx

Trip to Abberley Hall

We sent out information about a trip to Abberley Hall in May. The response has been amazing, we will try and sort out another date.   

Summer Event at Bryn Gwyn Hall

Our visit to Bryn Gwyn Hall is now confirmed for Sunday 11th June, where we will be treated to two private tours, one around the house and one around the gardens followed by a drinks and canapé reception in the garden weather permitting. We will be sending out more detailed information later today. Nichola Dapling will be available to take bookings in person at the meeting on Wednesday.

John Weaver Dance Festival

We mentioned last month that one of the projects we are supporting this year is the celebrations of John Weaver taking place in March & July this year. Shrewsbury School is hosting a dance festival from Friday 17th March to Sunday 19th March where young people will compete to perform at the showcase event held in St Mary’s church in July.

Within this event at 12.30 on Sunday 19th Moira Goff will be giving a lecture entitled The History of Dance. I think this will be worth a visit even if it is Mother’s Day!  Tickets are free but need to be booked through ticket source. https://www.ticketsource.co.uk/whats-on/shrewsbury/barnes-theatre/john-weaver-dancer-teacher-choreographer-and-writer-lecture-by-moira-goff/e-edgpoo

Cound Art Exhibition

This exhibition is celebrating local artists from around Shropshire, it is being held at St Peter’s Church Cound from 2-5pm on 22nd April & 23rd April. Entry is free, so just turn up.  A Private View, including drinks & canapes, is being held on the evening of  21st April from 6.30 -9pm. Tickets cost  £15, please contact  Claire England if you would like to attend this event her email address is englandclaire@icloud.com.

All funds raised will be split between  St Peter’s Church, Cound Guildhall and Air Ambulance.

 be some flyers available at our meeting next Wednesday.

Arts Society Community Grant

We have applied for our Community Grant of £250 from Head Office which is available to us for community arts projects. This year we are using it to match fund our sponsorship of the Art Club at The Hive.  This is a great way to enhance the money you so generously donate each month to Young Arts via our raffle.  

West Midlands Area

Jill Robinson & Nichola Dapling came with me last week to attend the area meeting in Edgbaston where we got together with some other committee members from neighbouring Arts Societies to share ideas and issues. This month we were focusing on two topics, publicity, and lecturers. It is always good to hear how other societies publicise themselves, many spend quite a lot of money in doing so which I am loathe to do. However, we could make more use free magazines and social media with free accounts. This did however make us acutely aware that we are still lacking a member of our committee leading on publicity. Does anyone have a burning desire to help us promote ourselves?  You wouldn’t be on your own, we work as a team. If you want to find out more come and have a chat with me or another member of the committee on Wednesday, either before the lecture or after over a cup of tea, no obligation.  We do have a lot of fun on our committee as well as running your society. I have been on this committee now for 5 years and I have found it extremely rewarding

I look forward to seeing you next Wednesday.

Best wishes

Lucy

Lucy Harvey-Scholes

Chairman The Arts Society Shrewsbury

lucy@harveyscholes.co.uk

Dear Members

HAPPY NEW YEAR!!

I can’t believe we are now in 2023, where has the time gone!!
I hope you all had a wonderful break over Christmas and had a lovely time celebrating with friends and family.
I had a great, but busy, time. We had 12 in total, all my four children returned home with one extra girlfriend and then one of my sisters and her family joined us. Far too much eating and drinking amongst a lot of hilarity and celebrating.
 
I am very much looking forward to our lecture on Wednesday on Augustus John, I think we are in for a treat. In fact when I look through the programme for 2023 I get very excited, Ceri & Jill have surpassed themselves with such an array of different topics all of which are extremely interesting. I would like to thank them on behalf of us all for their hard work.
I have become aware that several members have not collected their 2023 programme, they will be available as usual on the signing in desk on Wednesday, however if you are unable to get here this month, then do let us know, and we will happily post one to you.

Tea 
Thank you so much to those of you who have fed back their thoughts on tea. I am pleased to say that it seems very popular so we will; be introducing this as regular feature for the next few months. Unfortunately our society cannot afford to offer this for free so there will be a collection pot for you to put in your contributions. Please bring your change with you, the stadium charge us £2 for a cup of tea or coffee.
Please note for those of you who wish to come for lunch then soup and sandwiches will be available from 12.15pm as usual. Tea is an extra, it is not instead of lunch
 
Second Trip to Acton Scott Hall
Some of us were lucky enough to join the second trip to Acton Scott Hall last week, It was a lovely day, despite the rain. I think all but one of us managed to navigate the floods to get there, for what was an extremely interesting and enjoyable trip. Francis & Alison Acton have made an incredible start to their tenure of Acton Scott Hall. They only inherited it two years ago and they have developed a varied programme of events to ensure the hall can be maintained. The hall has such a lovely atmosphere and they made us feel very welcome at their family home. I believe it is one of the reasons we exist as a society, to allow us  to access houses around Shropshire that are not necessarily open for individual visits.
 
 

Glasgow Trip
Thank you to everyone who has booked onto the Glasgow trip, we know some of you are disappointed not to have booked early enough. Unfortunately we can’t increase our numbers as we are constrained by the restrictions imposed by some of the houses we are visiting. However, all is not lost, Brightwater holidays offer almost the same tour (not including the visits on our way up and down from Glasgow). They have a choice of two dates in 2023 which can be booked directly with them although you will have to make your own way to Glasgow. Here is a link to their website. https://www.brightwaterholidays.com/tours/scenic-scottish-tours/glasgow-s-art-treasures-featuring-the-burrell-collection/
 
Leicester Trip
Keep an eye on your inbox as we will be sending out details about our Leicester trip very soon. Leicester cathedral is undergoing major refurbishment at the moment, so no one is able to visit King Richard’s tomb. However, we have organised a private talk about the King and the Cathedral and there will be time to visit the Guildhall if you would like. 

Young Arts
Gloria Partridge has been working hard behind the scenes searching out Young Arts Projects in Shropshire that are in need of support. She has found a varied array of disciplines  to support which we will be discussing at our next committee meeting which is before our lecture on Monday. Please do keep supporting our raffle as it enables us to help local charities and trusts to bring joy and fulfilment to our Shropshire Youth
I very much look forward to seeing you all on Wednesday
  
Best wishes
 
Lucy 
Lucy Harvey-Scholes
Chairman
lucy@harveyscholes.co.uk
 

plus gratuity for the coach drive

Please send Cheques to Cathy Young Ashleigh. Hunter Street Shrewsbury SY3 8QN

Places will be allocated on first come first served basis. 

We organised two private tours of  Acton Scott Hall one in November 2022 & the other in January 2023, they both followed the same format although there was more rain in January! The photograph, which includes Francis & Alison Acton, was taken on the November tour. 

Our group of 25 assembled on the green in front of the house and we were welcomed by Francis and Alison Acton, whose family have owned the estate for over 900 years. The house dates back to 1580.

Francis gave us a very informative introductory talk about the house and its history. 

We then divided into 2 groups for the tour. The groups were led separately by Francis and Alison and the many fascinating aspects of the house were pointed out to us which included the wonderful panelling, the heraldry and the artworks. The family history is being researched by Francis and Alison and discoveries are continually coming to light.

After the tours, we enjoyed a wonderful buffet lunch.

Some of us then went for a short garden tour with Francis - this included the secret rock garden which is being restored. We were pleased to have heeded the advice to take our wellies!

Our group of 25 assembled on the green in front of the house on a fine day.
We were welcomed by Francis and Alison Acton, whose family have owned the estate for over 900 years. The house dates back to 1580.
The photo which includes Francis and Alison was taken just after this talk.
Francis gave us a very informative introductory talk about the house and it’s history and we then divided into 2 groups for the tour. The groups were led separately by Francis and Alison and the many fascinating aspects of the house were pointed out to us which included the wonderful panelling, the heraldry and the artworks. The family history is being researched by Francis and Alison and discoveries are still coming to light.
After the tours, we enjoyed a wonderful buffet lunch.
Some of us then went for a short garden tour with Francis - this included the secret rock garden which is being restored. We were pleased to have heeded the advice to take our 

The Arts Society Shrewsbury celebrated its 40th Anniversary at the Society's Annual Christmas Lecture & Lunch in early December.

On Wednesday 7th December 2022 the lunch guests, which included 5 past chairmen, and a member of the founding committee, all of whom are still current members of our society, were entertained by Tobias Capwell. Toby is currently curator of arms and armoury at The Wallace Collection in London and the audience thoroughly enjoyed his lecture "Nothing says Christmas like an axe fight", learning a lot about the practical aspects of jousting as he is also a highly acclaimed competitor of Jousting Competitions.

The Arts Society Shrewsbury (formerly NADFAS Shrewsbury) has been in existence for 40 years. To help celebrate Liz Woods, Chairman of Trustees of The Arts Society in London, joined the lunch along with Rob Hubbleday, Chairman of the West Midlands Area. Howard Franklin (President of Shrewsbury) gave a brief synopsis of the last 40 years which was responded to by Liz Woods. The celebrations were a great success, the buzz in the room was fantastic with everyone enjoying themselves. Lucy Harvey-Scholes (Chairman of Shrewsbury) would like to thank the members and guests who generously donated to a raffle raising £490 in aid of the Society's Young Arts Fund. This fantastic boost to the funds will allow us to support at least three new Young Arts projects in the county. These will be finalised at the next committee meeting.

We were so thrilled to welcome Liz Woods Chair of The Arts Society Trustees in London and Rob Hubbleday Chair of West Midlands Area to help us celebrate 40 years of our Society. It was wonderful that they both took time out of their busy schedules to join our day. 

They both commented on the wonderful atmosphere in the room and how friendly everyone was as they chatted with members and past chairmen of our society.

We took the opportunity to capture the gathering of past and present officers.

From Left to right 

Liz Woods: Chair of Trustees of The Arts Society; Rob Hubbleday: Chairman of the West Midlands Area; Yvonne Bridgland: Past Chairman; Margaret Locke: Past Chairman; June Whittaker: Founder Member; Deborah Yates: Past Chairman; Roly Trevor-Jones: Past Chairman & Trustee of The Arts Society; Eve Barker: Past Chairman; Howard Franklin: President of The Arts Society Shrewsbury; Lucy Harvey-Scholes: Current Chairman of The Arts Society Shrewsbury

Members Tea Party

Following our October lecture, we ran our annual tea party for new members which was a great success. Having spoken to many members over the last month it seems there is an appetite for socialising after the lecture.  This month, as a one-off, we will offer tea to everyone free of charge at the end of the lecture. Please let us have feedback as we would be happy to continue this, however we would ask for contributions to cover costs going forward.

Dear Members

This is my first newsletter to you as chairman of our wonderful society and I hope it finds you all well. I would just like to say that I feel very privileged to be able to serve you as chairman and look forward to next three years.

We welcome four new members to our committee who are all extremely keen to get involved and will have the benefit from learning from our very experienced members. One could say we have the best of both worlds, a voice of experience and an injection of new ideas.

Members Tea Party

Following our October lecture, we ran our annual tea party for new members which was a great success. Having spoken to many members over the last month it seems there is an appetite for socialising after the lecture.  This month, as a one-off, we will offer tea to everyone free of charge at the end of the lecture. Please let us have feedback as we would be happy to continue this, but would ask for contributions to cover costs. We strive to keep our subscription fees as low as possible, which are used to fund the costs of providing the venue and our excellent lecturers.

Over the next few months, I want to use these newsletters to celebrate the good works that our members carry out within our community. As many of us know our monthly lectures are only a small part of being a member of our Society.

Church Recording

This month I would like to draw your attention to Church Recording. This is a niche part of our Society and at present we have 11 committed volunteers recording at St Michael’s Church, Alberbury. This is very rewarding work particularly if you are interested in history and enjoy researching a varied array of topics. As you can imagine there are an amazing number of different types of objects to be found in a church all of which tell their own individual story.

Martin Locke, who many of you know, has run Shrewsbury’s church recording team for three projects since 2012: Grinshill, Shrewsbury’s Unitarian Church  and now Alberbury. His team is looking for new members to get involved early in 2023, when they hope to have completed the Alberbury Project and, after a pause, will be looking for a new church to get their teeth into next autumn. We are one of many societies in the UK carrying out this vital work under the auspices of the recently formed Church Recording Society which is currently developing UK-wide training to sustain church recording for the future.

Before the lecture there will be a slideshow showing on the screen giving you a taste of church recording to whet your appetite. Martin will be around before and after the lecture if any of you would like to find out more about it. He will have examples of previous records our Society has produced to explain what is involved. So far in the UK Church Recorders have recorded 2000 churches, there are many more!

Koestler Trust

You may remember last year we made a donation along with other West Midlands Societies to the Koestler Trust. Since 1962 they have been championing Artwork in prisons as a form of rehabilitation. Here is a link to their website to find out more about them. https://koestlerarts.org.uk/

The pilot scheme they were able to run based on Arts Society donations allowed them to run 3 workshops in separate prisons. They took two artists to each one and several members of Koestler Trust and in total involved 28 prisoners. Several of the artists they employed were ex-prisoners who have become successful artists on release from prison.

James, Gloria and I were lucky enough to attend the West Midlands Regional Arts Society committee meeting a couple of weeks ago where Sarah Matheve the Director of Outreach at Koestler Arts gave us an inspiring presentation. If any of you are in London there is a free exhibition of the Art submitted for the Koestler Arts Awards on at The Southbank until 18th December. The feedback has been brilliant. Koestler’s latest newsletter is at https://koestler.s3.eu-west-2.amazonaws.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/07/28115746/Associates-Newsletter-Summer-2022.pdf

 Upcoming Events

It is so wonderful to see so many of you sign up for our trip to Acton Scott which quickly became oversubscribed. You will have received information about a second trip on 10th January. Places are limited as those who couldn’t get on the first trip are being given first refusal.

The Christmas party reservations are going well, just a reminder that Cathy needs your applications by 30th November. This is usually a lovely start to the festive season.

We are also excited to announce that our first away trip since covid will take place next April to Glasgow. Watch out for more information.

I look forward to seeing you all on Wednesday at our lecture when Ian Swankie comes to tell us all about Public Art & Street Art. Quite topical, did you see the Shropshire Star at the end of October, we had a visitor ‘Disney‘ the street artist often referred to as Birmingham’s Banksy. He did an amazing picture on the back of the BT building, worth a visit.

Best wishes

Lucy

Lucy Harvey-Scholes

Chairman

The Arts Society Shrewsbury

lucy@harveyscholes.co.uk

October 2022

Dear Members

I hope that, like me, you’re looking forward to our October lecture, ‘The Treasures of the Far Cathay’ with Peter Le Rossignol.  I’ve had a peek at his slide set and there are some wonderful images of Chinese jade, porcelain and jewellery and some amazing clocks.. 

Don’t forget that it’s our AGM this month, so please be in your seats by 13.45 to avoid disruption.

I will be standing down as Chairman at this meeting and handing over to our very capable Vice Chairman, Lucy Harvey-Scholes.  I would like to thank you all for your support over the last 3 years.  The Covid pandemic certainly made things challenging, but you, our members, showed flexibility and tenacity, coping with Zoom lectures, facemasks and reduced activities as we dealt with lockdowns and social distancing.  We also owe a debt of gratitude to everyone on the committee for ‘hanging on in the face of adversity’!  I’m sure you will join me in expressing our thanks to them at the AGM, and will show the same support to Lucy during what I sincerely hope will be a calmer and more normal tenure as Chairman.

Something which we have been prevented from doing over the last 2 years due to Covid restrictions is our ‘New Members Tea Party’ when new members are invited to stay after the October meeting for tea, cake and an opportunity to chat and meet people.  We are delighted to reinstate the tradition this year.  If you have joined The Arts Society Shrewsbury since October 2020, please contact Lucy on lucy@harveyscholes.co.uk to confirm your attendance.  It will help us to work out how much cake to make!

 Thank you to all those of you who have already paid your subscriptions – we really appreciate your continued support.  If you haven’t renewed yet, you can pay by BACS and  download the membership form at www.theartssocietyshrewsbury.org.uk/DocumentStore/Membership form 2022 2023.pdf  or pick up a paper copy and pay by cheque when you arrive.  We will continue to send links to the lectures to everyone on our mailing list in October, since we realise some of you may have been away.  You will not be sent any further Zoom lecture links if you have not renewed your membership by 1st November so please sign up now to avoid disappointment!

I hope that you will be able to join us for our November lecture on Wednesday 16 November when Ian Swankie will be talking about ‘From Bronzes to Banksy - An Armchair Tour of Public Art and Street Art’.  Mm, what should we do with Clive of India in the Market Square?

And on December 7th we will be celebrating Christmas with a festive lunch preceded by Tobias Capwell on ‘Nothing says Christmas like an Axe Fight: Courtly spectacles of the Renaissance’ which sounds a lot of fun.  Don’t forget that the Christmas lecture is at 11 o’clock and is not on the usual 3rd Wednesday of the month.   Keep an eye on your in-box for details and application form.

And that’s it from me as I leave you in Lucy’s capable hands.

With my best wishes

Deborah

Chairman, The Arts Society Shrewsbury

deb@yates.uk.net

A Summer Event will take place at Hencote on the outskirts of Shrewsbury at 3.30pm on June 11th 2022.

Set above the town, with commanding views over the Shropshire countryside, Hencote is a ‘destination’ working vineyard with the first vines planted only in 2015.    

There will be a private winery and vineyard tour with a tasting of 5 Hencote wines. This will be followed by a canapé reception which will include a glass of their own sparkling wine. 

Hencote is on the Ellesmere Road about 2 miles from central Shrewsbury - postcode SY4 3AA

Visit   www.hencote.com    

      We are delighted to invite you to An Arts Society Picnic on August 18th, 
      please see the details from Corinne below. Our apologies for the short notice. 
      We did have a more formal event booked for early July which fell victim to
      lockdown, so this is an ad-hoc spontaneous replacement to allow us to meet
      up and socialise during a private visit to a beautiful garden.  We do hope that you
      will be able to join us. 

Summer Social Event
at
Cruckfield House, Shoothill. Ford.  SY5 9NR
on
Wednesday 18th August 2021
4pm-6.30pm.
by kind permission of Mr Geoff Cobley.
 
Entry by prepayment only and places are £7.00 pp
Proceeds will go to The National Garden Scheme - a registered charity
that is a major supporter of the work of Macmillan Cancer Support,
Marie Curie, Hospice UK and The Queen’s Nursing Institute.
 
Please bring your own refreshments and picnic chairs
if you think you will require these , there will be some chairs provided.
This event will be entirely outside.
 We are sorry but there can be no refunds if weather is
poor and you decide not to come.
 
Please reply to Corinne Russell by email stating how
many places you wish to reserve and the names of attendees 
corinne.russell50@gmail.com
  

      Please pay on line at if you can:    Ref: 'your full name'
                                                             Sort code 20-77-85
                                                             Account number 00803405 

      If you pay by cheque, please make this payable to
      The Arts Society Shrewsbury and send to;
      Corinne Russell,
      Butchers Cottage,
      Weston Lullingfields,
      Shrewsbury SY42AA

      If you require a receipt, please enclose an sae with your cheque;
      otherwise, confirmations will be sent by email - where possible.

Dear members

In my last newsletter I said that I hoped we would by now have more clarity on when we could restart physical meetings.  However, as I write this, we still await a decision on when ‘mass indoor meetings’ will be allowed, and whether any additional precautions such as mask-wearing or social distancing will be required.  I’m sure many of us will be listening to the Prime Minister’s announcement on Monday with interest.

We will have a committee meeting when we have a clearer idea of the changes to lockdown restrictions and will keep you informed of our plans.  Meanwhile, we will be renewing our Zoom licence with The Arts Society, so we will definitely be back in one way or another at 2 pm on Wednesday 15 September after the summer break.  The lecture will be ‘Turner vs Constable: The Great British Paint off’ with Nicola Moorby discussing the rivalry between two of our greatest artistic national treasures.  That sounds like an excellent start to our Autumn season.

Our lecture this month, at 2 pm on Wednesday 16 June, is on ‘The Frick Collection, New York, The Wallace Collection, London, and their link with Knole’ with Hilary Williams.  I’m sure many of us have visited the Wallace Collection and enjoyed seeing the wonderful artworks there.  Fewer of us have had the chance to view the fabulous Frick Collection in New York, and with the current restrictions on international travel, we should seize the opportunity to do so!

Good news for all those of you who pre-booked copies of Fifty Treasures of the West Midlands – they have arrived from the publishers and look fantastic, particularly since the front cover is Martin Locke’s photograph of the Darwin statue.  What an excellent advertisement for Shrewsbury!  I will be picking up the books and distributing them to committee members over the next few days so you will be able to pick them up from someone near you.  I will contact everyone on the list to give you details of how to pay for your copies before picking them up.  For those of you who didn’t pre-order a copy, we do have spares on this print run.  Details of how to order them can be found on this News page; see item, on left, below my May newsletter.   I look forward to hearing from you.

In a normal (pre-covid) year, you would have been receiving the June newsletter in a envelope stuffed with papers for the AGM, subscription renewals etc.  We then would have closed down for the summer with all our plans for the autumn securely in place.  A huge thank you to all of you for sticking with us during these very strange times and to the many of you who have moved to electronic communications only (think how many trees we’ve saved).  Please keep an eye on your in-box and we will do our best to keep you up to date with what we will be doing from September onwards. 

Wishing you all a very happy and healthy summer
Deborah
deb@yates.uk.net
 

Dear Members

I hope this finds you well and that you are looking forward to seeing more of your friends and family over the coming months.  The weather during recent weeks has not been conducive to socialising outside, so being able to meet a few people indoors is very welcome.

Thank you to everyone who posted feedback on Simon Rees’s lecture on ‘Carmen in Spain,’ either on the website or via email.  There were a lot of comments about how much you appreciated his anecdotes of life as a dramaturg for Welsh National Opera, although one or two people said that the sound quality of some of the music excerpts could have been better.  I agree.   We always have a rehearsal with our lecturers a few days beforehand to check that everything is working well, including a sound-check on any music.  Unfortunately internet quality can be variable and unpredictable, so I apologise if any gremlins spoiled your enjoyment.

Our shared lecture with Stourbridge this month was a real treat, with Peter Medhurst talking about ‘The Genius of Beethoven’.  It’s clear that Peter’s lectures are carefully structured, as shown by his ring-binder of music and notes, but he has a way of delivering them in a relaxed and chatty way that make you feel like a valued guest in his music room.  I felt that I had a deeper understanding of Beethoven’s music by the end of the lecture, and that’s the sort of rewarding result that I was looking for when I joined The Arts Society.

Has anyone else been caught out by the changes in the weather?  I moved all my winter woollies to the back of the wardrobe then brought them out again when it became unseasonably chilly.  Friends complained of their greenhouses being crammed full of plants which were too tender to face frosty nights, but then gardeners, like farmers, are never entirely happy with the weather.  I hope that all of you, gardeners or not, will enjoy our lecture on Wednesday 19th May at 2 pm, with Timothy Walker discussing ‘The Subtle Science and Exact Art of Colour in English Garden Design - Why Gardening can Rank as a Fine Art’.   Personally, I think that garden design is a fine art.  Creating a balance of colours, shapes and textures is a compositional challenge which any artist faces, but to do so using living material and coping with different soil conditions, aspects, light requirements etc. has to be a unique level of difficulty.  Of course, a really good designer will create a garden which changes through the seasons and looks wonderful all year round, something which is definitely worthy of respect.  I’m looking forward to Timothy drawing parallels between garden design and the work of Rothko and Jackson Pollock; that sounds most intriguing.

Timothy Walker will also be giving Stourbridge’s June lecture, so we will not be joining them for that.  Our final lecture of the season will be at 2pm on Wednesday 16 June when Hilary Williams will be telling us about the links between ‘The Frick Collection, New York, The Wallace Collection and The Knole Collection’. 

Don’t forget that you can watch the lectures even if you are away on holiday.  Provided that you have a reasonable broadband signal, you can use the link to join us wherever you are by using your tablet, laptop or even your mobile phone. 

Finally, a few people have asked when we plan to re-start physical meetings.  We appreciate everyone wants to know but I’m sure you’ll understand that it is difficult to make any firm plans at the moment.  We will be guided both by the government guidelines when they are finalised, and by advice from The Arts Society.  We hope that we will have more clarity next month.

I look forward to seeing you on Wednesday.

Stay safe and take care

With best wishes to you all

Deborah

deb@yates.uk.net

Dear Members
I’m pleased to be able to offer you the opportunity to pre-order the new book which our local Arts Society Area will be publishing shortly, entitled ‘Fifty Treasures of the West Midlands’.  You may remember that we, along with our other local societies, nominated places or objects which are less generally known to be included.  These are items and locations of artistic interest or importance which are off the well-trodden tourist trail and which may be overlooked by standard guidebooks.  In times when we are being encouraged to stay local, it will be useful to have a handy guide to things and places which can all be reached in a day trip. The book might also just make an ideal birthday/Christmas present for a relative or friend!
The price will be £5, and can be picked up from a committee member near you. Alternatively, they can be posted to you for an additional £2.  The books are good quality paperbacks with full colour illustrations of each object or place, together with a brief description and contact details, usually the website address. 
If you would like to reserve a copy, please email me on deb@yates.uk.net with the following information.
 
Name: 
Email:
Phone number:
Number of copies:
  
Many thanks,
 Deborah
deb@yates.uk.net

Dear Members

I do hope that you have had a good Easter and that, now we have a little more freedom, you have been  able to get out and about in this lovely spring sunshine.  It is so heartening to see things moving a little closer to normality.  Two items at the end of this newsletter may help to bolster that sense of progress – an opportunity to join a heritage conservation project, which you can do from home, and the chance to pre-order the forthcoming book ’50 Treasures of the West Midlands’.
Thank you for your feedback on Lesley Primo’s lecture on Foreigners in London.  It was very highly rated, with a number of you commenting on the excellent quality of the images and the interesting, unfamiliar artists which Lesley discussed.  It is very helpful if you leave feedback for the lectures which you watch;  just go to the home page of our website www.theartssocietyshrewsbury.org.uk and click on the Feedback icon in the lower right corner of the Home screen.  You will need the password Shrew1 to sign in.
The Stourbridge lecture earlier this month on Modern Art and the Old Masters was certainly thought provoking.  Val Woodgate looked at how the different genres of art have developed over the centuries, and at times one was left asking if new art is really original, or just a derivative re-hashing of existing ideas.  Val’s discussion of the relationship between Damien Hurst’s work and 17th Century Dutch vanitas paintings did leave me wondering about the originality of some of his works.
I am looking forward to our lecture this month on Wednesday 21st April at 2pm with Simon Rees talking about ‘Carmen in Spain’.  Carmen captures so much of the vibrancy and passion of flamenco culture, and it has always surprised me that both the novel and the opera were written by Frenchmen.  I was also surprised that flamenco culture is still alive and well in much of Andalucía, and not just something served up for tourists.  A few years ago, we visited a small village in Southern Spain on the day after their fiesta and were delighted to see frilly flamenco frocks drying on balconies, while the small children practised their dance steps in the playground.    The dancing is wonderful to watch but I find that genuine flamenco singing is something of an acquired taste!
We have two dates for your diary in May.  The Stourbridge lecture will be at 10.55 on Thursday 13th May, with Peter Medhurst talking about The Genius of Beethoven.  Last year was the 250th anniversary of Beethoven’s birth, so ideally we should have had the lecture then, but everything is running a little late following Covid disruption!  Beethoven was a true creative colossus so Peter has plenty of glorious music to get his teeth into.
Our own lecture is on Wednesday 19th May at 2pm, with Timothy Walker discussing ‘The Subtle Science and Exact Colour in English Garden Design’.  It is some time since we had a horticultural talk, so I’m sure this will inspire us all to look more closely at our own gardens and those we visit over the coming summer.
And talking of getting out and about, we will be sending you a pre-order form later this week for the new Arts Society book ‘Fifty Treasures of the West Midlands’.  We don’t have an exact publication date yet, but if you could let me know if you would like to buy a copy, it will help me to order approximately the right number.  The price will be £5, and they will be available to pick up from a committee member near you. 
Finally, a note from Gloria Partridge to anyone who is interested in participating in a heritage conservation project.
We have received a request from the Kings Shropshire Light Infantry who have asked for our help in restoring the kneelers in their Regimental Chapel in St. Chad’s Church.  The stitching of the kneelers is in very good condition but the primary problem with them is that the padding needs to be replaced.  They therefore need to be unpicked, washed, the padding removed and replaced with something more suitable and comfortable for the knees, and then put back together again.  The Trustees of the Regiment will pay for all costs incurred and importantly the work can be done from home and there is no deadline for completion.
This is such a worthwhile project and will certainly make a difference to the worshippers who use the Chapel on a regular basis.  I do hope some of you would like to help.  Gloria.
Please contact Gloria on 07739161809 if you are interested or have any questions about this project. 
I look forward to seeing you on Wednesday for our lecture and seeing how many of us have managed to get appointments at the hairdressers in the last week – I haven’t!
Stay safe and take care
With best wishes to you all
Deborah
deb@yates.uk.net
 

We have received a request from the Kings Shropshire Light Infantry who have asked for our help in restoring the kneelers in their Regimental Chapel in St. Chad’s Church.  The stitching of the kneelers is in very good condition but the primary problem with them is that the padding needs to be replaced.  They therefore need to be unpicked, washed, the padding removed and replaced with something more suitable and comfortable for the knees, and then put back together again.  The Trustees of the Regiment will pay for all costs incurred and importantly the work can be done from home and there is no deadline for completion.
This is such a worthwhile project and will certainly make a difference to the worshippers who use the Chapel on a regular basis.  I do hope some of you would like to help.  Please contact me on 07739161809 if you are interested or have any questions about this project.
Gloria Partridge

Dear Members

What a relief that Spring is here and some easing of the Lockdown is in sight.   I went to Telford for my first jab last week and it was the furthest I’ve been and the most exciting thing that I’ve done in months, and one doesn’t always use Telford and exciting in the same sentence! 

I have found that our lectures have helped to keep me sane over the winter.  A combination of art and intellectual challenge can take your mind away from everyday life by making you think, and by bringing back happy memories.  Thank you to everyone who wrote to tell me how much they enjoyed our last lecture on Homer’s World of Heroes.  I really enjoyed reading about your memories of studying classics at school or visiting the ancient sites on Swan Hellenic cruises.  Everyone was impressed by lecturer Neil Faulkner’s blend of knowledge and enthusiasm, together with his ability to communicate clearly and confidently on Zoom.  I can imagine that its not easy to deliver an hour-long lecture to an audience which you can’t see, but his delivery and timing were just right.

It was entirely coincidental that Stourbridge’s lecture was also on Ancient Greece since our respective programme secretaries would have had no idea that we would be sharing lectures when the talks were booked in 2019.  The Elgin Marbles are beautiful works of art and I thought Stephen Kershaw covered the story of the politics surrounding their acquisition and the fight over their ownership very well.  Did anyone see the recent programme on Stonehenge on BBC2?  Archaeologists have discovered that the bluestones of Stonehenge were not only quarried in the Preseli Hills in Wales, but also originally stood there as a stone circle for 400 years before being moved to Stonehenge.  I do hope that the Senedd aren’t going to ask if they can have them back!

Our lecture this month is on Wednesday 17 March at 2 pm, with Lesley Primo talking about ‘Foreigners in London: The Artists who changed the course of British Art’.   When I read the introduction which Lucy sent out with the link, I was struck by how many Dutch and Flemish artists made their careers here, often working for the Court and the aristocracy.  They must have been excellent linguists.  My first job was with Unilever, an Anglo-Dutch company, and I was always very impressed by the linguistic skills of my Dutch colleagues, one of whom explained that if you work with the English, French and Germans, you soon realise that they aren’t going to learn Dutch …

Next month, we join Stourbridge for their lecture on ‘Modern Art and The Old Masters’ at 10.55 am on Thursday 15 April. Val Woodgate will be looking at how the representation of traditional genres, such as portraiture or landscape, has changed over the centuries.  I know that a few of us have joined Val’s study day on Symbolism which I mentioned in my last newsletter.  She really is an excellent lecturer.

Our own April lecture will be at 2.00 pm on Wednesday 21 April, with Simon Rees talking about ‘Carmen in Spain’.  Many of you will remember that we were due to have this talk in June 2019 during our Spanish year.  Unfortunately Simon had to be rushed into hospital on the morning of the lecture to have a detached retina repaired, but a guest of Pippa Walker’s kindly stepped in to speak to us about ‘Anchorites in Shropshire’ which was fascinating.  It is lovely to have the opportunity to welcome Simon to our Society and we look forward to some Spanish warmth.

I hope that you enjoyed the Arts Society Worcester tour, ‘ Wilde about Oscar - In the footsteps of Oscar Wilde’ with Simon Whitehouse.  I loved Wilde’s quotations, and Simon was a very good tour guide, but ultimately it was a sad story of human intolerance.  That will be the last lecture which we will be sharing as a society with Worcester although, as I mentioned last month, you can join future Arts Society Worcester tours for £5 per person at www.theartssocietyworcester.org.uk/Visits/FutureVisits.aspx  

Alternatively, you might choose to join Arts Society Wrekin on Wednesday 14th April for a ‘Virtual Tour of the Twelve Great Livery Companies of the City of London’ with Simon Whitehouse www.theartssocietywrekin.org.uk/Visits/FutureVisits.aspx    or you could join Stratford on Avon society on a virtual day trip to the West Country, see https://stradfas.org.uk/day-visit-3/     If you are planning to join any events with other societies, please remember to allow time for your payment by bank transfer to be picked up by their administrator and for the link to be sent out to you in time for the lecture. 

I am looking forward to seeing everyone at our March lecture.  Don’t worry, we all have Lockdown Hair, although our friends in Wales may be looking rather better groomed since hairdressers there opened this week.  Meanwhile, the daffodils are flowering, the birds are singing and the days are getting longer and warmer, all of which is definitely making me feel happier!  I hope that it’s having the same effect on you.

Do stay safe and take care.

With best wishes to you all

Deborah

deb@yates.uk.net

We are delighted, after two successful shared lectures with The Arts Society Stourbridge in 2020, that we can continue to watch their lectures - free of charge for the time being.  Thus, together with our own lectures and those from Stourbridge, we will be able to watch two, full, live lectures each month, plus the shorter 'mini' monthly lectures offered by TAS London, all of which should undoubtedly brighten the coming spring!  

A Mailchimp link to each Stourbridge lecture will be sent out the day before so keep an eye on your in-box. You can see their list of future lectures, starting at 10:55, here

We do hope that you will be able to join us.

(Admin update on 17/02/21)

Dear Members

I hope that this finds you well and not too bored during lockdown.  Everyone I speak to has found  ways of keeping themselves occupied, from jigsaws and online bridge to language learning and crosswords, together with the pursuit of more hands-on skills such as painting, playing music, knitting, cake-making, online yoga and Pilates, not forgetting lots of walking.  You are a most creative and resourceful group of people! 
The news is generally optimistic, with the excellent roll out of the vaccine programme and reduction in number of Covid-19 cases giving us all hope that we will all be allowed out sometime.  However, the discussions about virus transmission and mutant strains do indicate that some form of social distancing will be in place for some time to come so, to help with planning, the committee has decided that we will stick with Zoom lectures until June.  Our programme secretaries, Pippa Walker and Lucy Harvey-Scholes have updated the lecture page until November, so you can go to our website and see what delights we have in store at  www.theartssocietyshrewsbury.org.uk/Lectures/FutureLectures.aspx   There are lectures on artists, jewellery, gardens, sporting architecture and great collections, so there should be something for everyone.  Thank you very much to Lucy and Pippa for their sterling work in giving us so much to look forward to!  We will also be sharing various lectures with The Arts Society Stourbridge and will be adding those details to the website shortly.
I enjoyed our January lecture on ‘The Glasgow Boys, The Glasgow Girls, The Scottish Colourists & The French Connection’ and saw a lot of paintings which made me want to learn more about them.  Personally I would have preferred more information on the Scottish artists which I didn’t know about, rather than on the French which I did, so I have since done some digging on YouTube and would recommend two BBC Scotland programmes.  The first is ‘The Glasgow Boys’ with Muriel Gray which you can find at www.youtube.com/watch?v=UsYNHFjQ0jQI  and the second is ‘Michael Palin on the Colourists’ which is at www.youtube.com/watch?v=2xK5cddoJsQ   Both are one hour programmes which have been broken into 15 minute segments, which may be something to do with YouTube’s format.  The presenters’ styles are very different, but both have a clear enthusiasm for, and knowledge of, their subjects.  I hadn’t realised that Muriel Gray was a graduate of The Glasgow School of Art and is now Chair of Governors there so is very well qualified to talk about the art of her city. 
I’m looking forward to our February lecture ‘Homer’s World of Heroes: Greece in the Mycenaean Age’ at    2 pm on 17 February: the speaker, Neil Faulkner, comes highly recommended.  I enjoyed the Greek myths as a child - does anyone else remember reading Enid Blyton’s ‘Tales from Long Ago’? -  but only read Homer more recently.  His stories are part of our culture, like episodes from the Bible or Shakespeare, so it will be interesting to learn more about the period and its art.
Stourbridge’s last talk, ‘The Borgias’ also followed an historical literary theme, but with the lecture given by a contemporary novelist.  Have any of you ordered Sarah Dunant’s books since watching her lecture?   She has a way of bringing history to life with genuine enthusiasm and knowledge and her illustrations were excellent.  Our thanks to Stourbridge for bringing some Italian warmth to a bitterly cold Shropshire morning!  Their next lecture is at 11 am on Thursday 11 March with Stephen Kershaw talking about The Elgin Marbles. 
 Our own March lecture will be on Wednesday 17 March at 2 pm, with Lesley Primo talking about ‘Foreigners in London: The Artists who changed the course of British Art’.  It’s sometimes hard to remember that artists such as Holbein, Lely and Van Dyck weren’t British, since they spent so much time here that we’ve mentally ‘adopted’ them, rather like Handel.  It sounds as though we’re in for a display of beautiful paintings – wonderful.
Can I confess to finding the last Guided Tour from The Arts Society Worcester disappointing? Unfortunately I wasn’t able to catch it live – my husband had a contretemps between his glasses and the elastic on his facemask (easily done) resulting in broken glasses and a lengthy session with a tube of superglue.  I tried the lecture on YouTube but found the jerky visuals and poor sound quality not conducive to concentration, so gave up after 15 minutes.  I know that some of you enjoyed watching it live; thank you very much for your feedback.
We will be taking one further Arts Society Worcester tour, ‘ Wilde about Oscar - In the footsteps of Oscar Wilde’, on Wednesday 3 March at 2 pm.  The tour will be led by Simon Whitehouse, an award winning Blue Badge guide, so it should be of a high standard.   I know that Worcester will be running further tours through the spring.  If you’re interested in watching those, you can find the details at www.theartssocietyworcester.org.uk/Visits/FutureVisits.aspx
If you are finding that time is hanging heavy on your hands during lockdown, some of our neighbouring societies have events which you are welcome to join.  The Arts Society Stourbridge has a ‘study day’ on ‘Signs and Symbols – The Hidden Messages in Paintings’ given by Val Woodgate.  [I’m sure many of you will remember Val speaking on ‘Picasso and his Women’ as part of our Spanish Year in 2019 - a  lecture which was both erudite and very entertaining.]  The ‘study day’ comprises 3 lectures over successive Monday mornings, at 11 am on 15, 22 and 29 March, covering symbolism in Christian, Secular and Modern Art.  Please note, the booking deadline is Monday 1 March.  Meanwhile, at 2 pm on Wednesday 10 March, The Arts Society Wrekin have a lecture by Gareth Williams, Curator and Head of Learning at Weston Park, on his new book, ‘The Country Houses of Shropshire’.  Details of both events and how to join them will be available on our website.
Other events from our local societies may be advertised on The Arts Society West Midlands Facebook page at www.facebook.com/TheArtsSocietyWestMidlandsArea/    I’ve also heard back from Head Office that, while they won’t be running any further live monthly lectures, they will be reinstating the mini lectures which they ran last summer, with a new series starting this spring.  The previous mini lectures are still on the website, so if you missed any, you can find them at www.connected.theartssociety.org/talks-lectures
The committee hope that these events will help to keep us intellectually stimulated and entertained over the coming weeks.  Meanwhile, do stay safe and take care.
With my best wishes to you all
Deborah
deb@yates.uk.net
 

Looking forward to joining The Arts Society Worcester for a virtual walking tour ‘Royal London; from Banqueting House to Buckingham Palace’, which will be streamed live by a Blue Badge Guide on Wednesday 3rd February at 2 pm.  Hope the weather is fine!  Log-in details will be sent out in a MailChimp email in due course.

Hello everyone and Happy New Year! 

I do hope that you were able to enjoy the festive season despite its limitations, disruptions and disappointments.  Does anyone else remember a song from early childhood where each verse finished ‘you in your small corner and I in mine’?  Christmas felt rather like that, as though we were pieces on a chess board and not allowed to share squares!  Thank goodness for telephones, Zoom and letters allowing us to communicate with friends and family in these difficult times.   One friend told me that this year has made her less materialistic because she has learned to put a higher value on the simple things, like human contact, that we so often take for granted.  I agree.

Talking of Zoom, I must apologise for the problem we had at the end of our December lecture when many of you were unable to unmute yourselves or switch on your videos.  I was so sorry that we couldn’t see each other.  I have spoken to a couple of Zoom experts who have been mystified by the cause.  If we have any Zoom experts in the society, please step forward; we need you.

The last year has seemed very long, confusing , frustrating and, at times, frightening.  I’m sure that many of us will be glad to move on from 2020 and look forward to happier and more sociable times to come. 

So, what do we have to look forward to this month?  I trust that you all have this Wednesday 6th January in your diaries, when Viv Haxby will be talking about The Queen’s Personal Jewellery Collection at 2 pm (see our Lectures page for details).  I hope that Viv talks about the beautiful brooch which the Queen was wearing during her Christmas broadcast; it would be lovely to know more about it.  If you’re not able to make the date, don’t worry, because you will be able to watch it later via The Arts Society Worcester’s website.   If you’re quick, you can have the bonus of watching a previous talk, a 30 minute ‘chat with an expert’ about landscape gardener Gertrude Jekyll if you go to the link – www.youtube.com/watch?v=6y0ux999HRA&feature=youtu.be   It is a low key chat rather than a lecture, but I enjoyed seeing Miss Jekyll’s very accomplished early watercolours and photographs of her garden at Munstead Wood from the 1920s.  This talk will be replaced by the Queen’s Jewellery lecture on Wednesday afternoon.

We then have another bonus talk on Tuesday 12th January at 2pm on the history of Shrewsbury Flaxmill Maltings.  You’ll remember that we nominated the Flaxmill as one of the 50 Treasures of the West Midlands because of its important role in architectural history.  We’re delighted that Dick Allen, one of the Friends of the Flaxmill Maltings, will be joining us to tell us about the history of the building and bring us up to date on the restoration project.  The Friends of the Flaxmill Maltings kindly offered this talk as a ‘thank you’ for nominating them for the Treasures book which will hopefully bring them more visitors in future.  I would certainly like to go on a guided tour there when such things are possible!  We have invited Wrekin Arts Society to join us for this talk.  Thank you very much to Gloria Partridge, our Heritage Volunteering representative on the committee, for organising this event.

Then on Wednesday 20th January at 2pm we have our usual lecture.  This month, Harry Fletcher will be talking about The Glasgow Boys, The Glasgow Girls, The Scottish Colourists & The French Connection.  If you look at the lectures page on our website you can see a synopsis of the lecture together with a beautiful painting of young women and flowers.  The colours really zing off the page!  You can see further examples of The Glasgow Boys work at the National Galleries Scotland website www.nationalgalleries.org/art-and-artists/features/glasgow-boys    I have to confess that I’ve not come across their work before, but that’s the joy of The Arts Society, it’s a wonderful way of expanding your horizons.

We don’t yet have information from Head Office about whether they are planning to run any further national lectures, but keep an eye on your inbox just in case.  The December lecture on Great Exhibitions didn’t really inspire me, but I’m sure some people loved it.  What I did find on the national website is an excellent Christmas quiz, which you may also have missed.  If you go to www.theartssociety.org/arts-news-features/art-quiz-christmas  then click on ‘download the quiz here’ it will take you to a series of multiple choice questions and some paintings to identify.  And don’t worry, all the answers are at the bottom of the page in the traditional manner, so you won’t be left scratching your head in frustration.

In case you’re looking for other things to do, we have posted a link on the website to some events which are being run by Wrekin Arts Society this spring, so you can take the opportunity to join those.   There’s also information on music masterclasses for young people run by Shropshire Music Services and sponsored by Wrekin Arts Society, which may be of interest to any budding musicians of your acquaintance.

Looking ahead to February, the dates for your diary are Wednesday 3rd February at 2pm for a virtual walking tour ‘Royal London; from Banqueting House to Buckingham Palace’, which will be streamed live by a Blue Badge Guide.  I do hope the weather is fine!   Then on Thursday 11 February at 2pm we join with The Arts Society Stourbridge for their lecture ‘The Borgias: The Most Infamous Family in History’, with novelist and broadcaster Sarah Dunant.  Our own lecture will be on Wednesday 17 February at 2pm on ‘Homer's World of Heroes: Greece in the Mycenaean Age’ with archaeologist Neil Faulkner. 

If you’re feeling that this is a very bleak midwinter then I trust that some of our offerings will cheer you up and provide you with both entertainment and food for thought.  On an optimistic note, the days are getting longer and brighter now that we’re past the solstice, the snowdrops and crocuses are pushing their way through the soil and spring is on its way.  The vaccination programme is giving us hope that life will return to normal at some stage, and I’m sure that we’re all very much looking forward to that.

With my best wishes to you all

Deborah

deb@yates.uk.net

Our Heritage Volunteers committee member, Gloria Partridge, has become a TV star by appearing in the first episode of the new series of BBC 1’s ‘Home is Where the Art Is’ on Monday, 6 July at 15.45. The programme involved three artists, a painter, ceramicist and wood sculptor all competing to produce an appropriate artwork for Gloria’s home.  If you missed it you can find the programme on iPlayer.
Read Gloria’s personal account of this memorable event here and view images here.