Saturday, April 19, 2014

Turner: Travel, Light and Landscape

Our 1.748 miles route, saved at http://www.gmap-pedometer.com/?r=6276750

would hardly be worth mentioning if it wasn't for the place or the opportunity to view a selection of some 30 works by Turner, drawn from the Walker Art Gallery, Lady Lever Art Gallery and Sudley House.
The exhibition takes a chronological approach to explore the artist’s life and work.

Paintings such as 'Margate Harbour' (1837) and 'Linlithgow Palace' (about 1807), are shown alongside prints and watercolours that are rarely displayed due to their light-sensitivity. Including the watercolours 'Dudley' (about 1830-33), 'Off Dover' (between 1820-1827), 'Wells Cathedral' (1795-96) and 'View of the Mole' (about 1818).
As we are chronologically enhanced we used our Merseyrail passes to travel under the Mersey to Bebington Station.
Here we took, what seemed a ridiculously long detour through the station car park and, once the other side of the fence, back, albeit downhill,  past the exit from the platform and down to the main road.
It didn't take long to reach the Lady Lever Art Gallery, where we enjoyed the exhibition and then refreshed our memories of one of the best collections in the UK. 


As you can see, it should be a place everyone should visit if they can.
I'm hope you agree, that such collections should be viewed via many visits rather than trying to cram it all into one.
Having absorbed as much as was appropriate, we headed of, through the model village which was built by Lever Brothers to accommodate workers in its soap factory (now part of Unilever); work commenced in 1888. The name is derived from Lever Brothers' most popular brand of cleaning agent, Sunlight.
Port Sunlight contains 900 Grade II listed buildings, and was declared a Conservation Area in 1978.
Port Sunlight has been informally suggested for World Heritage Site status to protect it from development and to preserve the unique character for future generations; however, it is not yet on the current UK "tentative list" for future consideration.
In the past, we've spent some time admiring the buildings.
Today the plan was to visit Mayer Park, that had somehow missed our attention on previous visits.
Merseyside and the Wirral are blessed with a wide range of open public parks and this added to our short but enjoyable walk in the sun.

The squirrels obviously have no fear of people and looked as if they were expecting us to provide food.
It was then back to grab some lunch at the cafe opposite Port Sunlight Station
Note: they don't take payments by card but the is a cash point a little further along the road.
After an enjoyable, good value lunch we wandered down to the Theatre, to see what was on, before catching the train home from Port Sunlight Station.
PS It was all completed in bright sunshine!

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