An artistic interlude in Sudbury.

This week I have been busy doing my ‘other’ job, producing On the House, the newsletter for Friends and volunteers at Gainsborough’s House in Sudbury. I enjoy doing this very much since working in the office at the museum for a few days gives me a lot of insights into the frantic activity involved in running a museum.

I would urge anyone who hasn’t been to Gainsborough’s House for a while to go in and take a look. At the moment you can see a very interesting exhibition of twentieth century works depicting images of Sudbury, but this will be finishing in a week or so. After that there will be a show that focuses on 18^th century prints of personalities from the Georgian era. The great growth in mass produced prints, taken from portraits, during this period is interesting, because it can be seen as the start of the cult of personality that we hear so much about today.

Over the past two years the house has been completely refurbished and the permanent collection, which includes more Gainsborough’s than are collected together anywhere else, is now really well presented. In addition to works in oils, the museum has a very good selection of drawings by the artist. In the past these only came out once a year, but now they can be viewed in the new study gallery where they are kept in drawers and thus protected from the light.

And then there is the wonderful garden! Even if you don’t want to go into the House to see the art, you can, for no charge at all apart from the cost of a coffee, drop in to the coffee shop and then have a wander around. There is an ancient mulberry tree and medlar and quince trees. Some of the plants are quite unusual, and there are often examples for sale.

Incidentally, writing about Gainsborough’s House this week doesn’t mean I’m already running out of steam with regard to life at Babergh District Council. Rather the reverse. Everything is rather new and confused at present for a new councillor and I need a little time to sort things out in my mind. Additionally now that the election is over I feel that I can and should add a little variety to the web-log!