Marjorie Arnfield
Encyclopedia
Marjorie Helen Arnfield, MBE
(25 November 1930 – 26 April 2001) was an English
artist who specialised in both industrial and rural landscapes, painting in oil, acrylic and watercolour. Her landscapes, particularly her paintings of Provence
and Spain
, are characterized by vivid colours and an impressionistic style. In an interview in the magazine Artists & Illustrators in 1998, Arnfield described her palette of colours, which included ochres, burnt siennas, cadmium, viridian, reds and blues, as "colours that sing".
in 1930 and brought up in Sunderland, attending Sunderland Church High School.
Her grandfather, great-uncle and two uncles were regional architects, responsible for many public buildings in the North East of England
, including the Sunderland Empire Theatre. While attending Sunderland College of Art, and King Edward VII College of Art, University of Durhamshe was taught by distinguished British artists such as Lawrence Gowing
, Quentin Bell
and Victor Passmore.
She travelled extensively in the Mediterranean with her late husband, Ron Arnfield. In her paintings of scenes from the Greek islands, France and Spain, she sought to capture the vibrancy of the sun and the natural colours. She also used colour to depict emotion, for example in her mining paintings. Arnfield portrayed the energy and excitement of football when she was invited by Sunderland Football Club
to watch one of their games in their new stadium
, and then paint a picture of the match.
In a catalogue for an exhibition of Mediterranean Images at the Pierrepoint Gallery in Newark, Nottinghamshire, England in September 1996, Arnfield wrote of the visual inspiration of her passion for the Mediterranean: "Vines dotted in rows across spring landscapes; distant mountains; poppies, stark, clustered among ochre grasses; cyprus trees forming punctuation marks; mediaeval villages, pantiled roofs; ultramarine skies....fishermen crouched mending nets; images seen and felt, evoking a spirit of place."
Arnfield's "well-developed sense of place and sympathetic observation of people" were highlighted in the catalogue of an exhibition of her work, People and Places, at Kirkbride Gallery, Peebles, Scotland
in September 1998. She spent many years teaching art to adults and schoolchildren in England and Scotland. She also took adults on painting holidays to France and the Greek islands. Disabled due to rheumatoid arthritis
, her husband Ron assisted her over the years with her exhibitions and teaching.
Sheila Smith, a British poet, included two poems she had written about Arnfield in "Woman Surprised by a Young Boy," a collection of poems by Smith which was published in July 2010 by Shoestring Press http://www.shoestring-press.com/2010/06/woman-surprised-by-a-young-boy/
The first poem, "Silence is Very Loud", refers to a visit Smith made to Arnfield's new studio after Arnfield's death, and to her old studio. The second, "Death of a Painter, for Marjorie" talks about Arnfield's unique vision, her ability to see in a landscape something that no-one else could see. The title of the collection, "Woman Surprised by a Young Boy," refers to a painting by the English artist Eileen Cooper
.
in 2000, the year before her death, for her "services to art".
In 2002-2003, Ron Arnfield commissioned a professional photographer to scan much of her work, including her sketchbooks. A CD-ROM, Marjorie Arnfield, A Digital Library, was then produced. A website showcasing her work was also created, but this has now lapsed.
, Nottinghamshire
. She was survived by her son, Robin.
Of an exhibition by Arnfield at the Mowbray Gallery in Sunderland in October 1964, a review in The Guardian stated: "Apart from a series of broad, fell country watercolours held together by a lyrical and febrile line, Arnfield, with a brief, decorous and decorative look in gouache and oil at industry in Whitehaven and Tee-side, seems most readily at home when, in pen and wash, she follows in the tradition of Raoul Dufy
and John Paddy Carstairs
." The review also described Arnfield as a "realist painter with an obvious appeal."
Speaking of Arnfield's English Lake District painting Hodbarrow Iron Mines and Collapsed Seawall, Babette Decker wrote that the "... work of Marjorie Arnfield was one of the most exciting discoveries for my book – an artist who opened one's eyes to the beauty of subjects one might otherwise dismiss as ugly".
Marjorie Arnfield, A Celebration of her Life and Work, which was published after her death in 2001, described her pictures as "embodying a spirit of vitality, optimism and sheer 'aliveness to it all'". She also left many sketchbooks and diaries which combined extensive comments on her travels with illustrations of what she saw. In December 2009, the Durham County Local History Society featured a life of Marjorie Arnfield in Volume 6 of the Society's Durham Biographies.
In October 1958, one of Arnfield's paintings, Landscape, County Durham, was selected for the Northern Young Artists exhibition that took place in October-November 1958 at the Graves Art Gallery, Sheffield. The Manchester artist L.S. Lowry was honorary president of the Northern Young Artists at that time, and was one of three people on the selection board that chose Arnfield's painting. In its catalogue for the 1965 summer exhibition of Arnfield's Lake District
paintings, the Netherhall Centre in Maryport, Cumbria, spoke of Arnfield's "appreciation of Cumbria's beauty and her up-to-date impressions of the industrial and social scene," which included a painting of the atomic power station at Sellafield.
. She decided to capture through her art something of the power and history of the mining industry, which was once a major contributor to the British economy.
In Marjorie Arnfield: Artist's Statement, a document produced for an exhibition at Bishop Auckland
Town Hall in 1999, Arnfield wrote that, prior to commencing her mining paintings, she turned to the writings of D. H. Lawrence
, some of whose novels had been strongly influenced by the East Midlands coal mines. "The disappearance of the pits that Lawrence knew (following the demise of the British coal mining industry) led me to explore the use of archival photographs as a source material for my paintings of miners at work", Arnfield wrote.
In 1994, British Coal
sponsored Arnfield’s exhibition A Tribute to Coal Mining in Nottinghamshire at Nottingham University's Djanogly Art Gallery. She then held a further 20 exhibitions of her mining art under the title "Images of Coal" at museums and art galleries across the UK. In her mining paintings, Marjorie Arnfield focused on historical mining methods, social aspects of mining communities, and the demolition of the pits. Her mining paintings were purchased by private collections, museums and art galleries. Opening an exhibition of Arnfield's coal mining art at Woodhorn Colliery Museum, journalist Kate Adie
said "It is only through Marjorie's images that young people of future generations will learn about this once-great industry [of coal-mining]."
At an exhibition of her work in Sunderland in 1997, Arnfield commented, "Pitheads, coal-blackened miners returning home, men scavenging for sea coal on beaches remain as vivid memories from my childhood and art school days in the North-East." According to The Artists of Northumbria, Arnfield was one of the few British women artists to show a particular interest in the theme of coal mining.
In July 2007, the Public Catalogue Foundation
said it would include a photograph of Arnfield's Keep The Pits Open: Protest painting in its forthcoming Oil Paintings in Public Ownership: West Yorkshire catalogue. The painting itself is held in the National Coal Mining Museum for England in Wakefield
, West Yorkshire.
Examples of Marjorie Arnfield's coal mining art can be seen on the BBC's Your Paintings website, which is operated in partnership with the Public Catalogue Foundation http://www.bbc.co.uk/arts/yourpaintings/paintings/search/painted_by/marjorie-arnfield
Order of the British Empire
The Most Excellent Order of the British Empire is an order of chivalry established on 4 June 1917 by George V of the United Kingdom. The Order comprises five classes in civil and military divisions...
(25 November 1930 – 26 April 2001) was an English
England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...
artist who specialised in both industrial and rural landscapes, painting in oil, acrylic and watercolour. Her landscapes, particularly her paintings of Provence
Provence
Provence ; Provençal: Provença in classical norm or Prouvènço in Mistralian norm) is a region of south eastern France on the Mediterranean adjacent to Italy. It is part of the administrative région of Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur...
and Spain
Spain
Spain , officially the Kingdom of Spain languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Spain's official name is as follows:;;;;;;), is a country and member state of the European Union located in southwestern Europe on the Iberian Peninsula...
, are characterized by vivid colours and an impressionistic style. In an interview in the magazine Artists & Illustrators in 1998, Arnfield described her palette of colours, which included ochres, burnt siennas, cadmium, viridian, reds and blues, as "colours that sing".
Biography
Marjorie Arnfield was born in Newcastle upon TyneNewcastle upon Tyne
Newcastle upon Tyne is a city and metropolitan borough of Tyne and Wear, in North East England. Historically a part of Northumberland, it is situated on the north bank of the River Tyne...
in 1930 and brought up in Sunderland, attending Sunderland Church High School.
Her grandfather, great-uncle and two uncles were regional architects, responsible for many public buildings in the North East of England
North East England
North East England is one of the nine official regions of England. It covers Northumberland, County Durham, Tyne and Wear, and Teesside . The only cities in the region are Durham, Newcastle upon Tyne and Sunderland...
, including the Sunderland Empire Theatre. While attending Sunderland College of Art, and King Edward VII College of Art, University of Durhamshe was taught by distinguished British artists such as Lawrence Gowing
Lawrence Gowing
Sir Lawrence Gowing was a British artist, writer, curator and teacher. Initially recognized as a portrait and landscape painter, he quickly rose to prominence as an art educator, writer, and eventually, curator and museum trustee...
, Quentin Bell
Quentin Bell
Quentin Claudian Stephen Bell was an English art historian and author.Bell was the son of Clive Bell and Vanessa Bell , and the nephew of Virginia Woolf . He was educated in London and at the Quaker Leighton Park School.Principally an artist, as a potter, he was drawn to academia...
and Victor Passmore.
She travelled extensively in the Mediterranean with her late husband, Ron Arnfield. In her paintings of scenes from the Greek islands, France and Spain, she sought to capture the vibrancy of the sun and the natural colours. She also used colour to depict emotion, for example in her mining paintings. Arnfield portrayed the energy and excitement of football when she was invited by Sunderland Football Club
Sunderland A.F.C.
Sunderland Association Football Club is an English association football club based in Sunderland, Tyne and Wear who currently play in the Premier League...
to watch one of their games in their new stadium
Stadium of Light
The Stadium of Light is an all-seater football stadium in Sunderland, England. With space for 49,000 spectators, the Stadium of Light has the fifth-largest capacity of any English football stadium. The stadium primarily hosts Sunderland A.F.C. matches...
, and then paint a picture of the match.
In a catalogue for an exhibition of Mediterranean Images at the Pierrepoint Gallery in Newark, Nottinghamshire, England in September 1996, Arnfield wrote of the visual inspiration of her passion for the Mediterranean: "Vines dotted in rows across spring landscapes; distant mountains; poppies, stark, clustered among ochre grasses; cyprus trees forming punctuation marks; mediaeval villages, pantiled roofs; ultramarine skies....fishermen crouched mending nets; images seen and felt, evoking a spirit of place."
Arnfield's "well-developed sense of place and sympathetic observation of people" were highlighted in the catalogue of an exhibition of her work, People and Places, at Kirkbride Gallery, Peebles, Scotland
Peebles
Peebles is a burgh in the committee area of Tweeddale, in the Scottish Borders, lying on the River Tweed. According to the 2001 Census, the population was 8,159.-History:...
in September 1998. She spent many years teaching art to adults and schoolchildren in England and Scotland. She also took adults on painting holidays to France and the Greek islands. Disabled due to rheumatoid arthritis
Rheumatoid arthritis
Rheumatoid arthritis is a chronic, systemic inflammatory disorder that may affect many tissues and organs, but principally attacks synovial joints. The process produces an inflammatory response of the synovium secondary to hyperplasia of synovial cells, excess synovial fluid, and the development...
, her husband Ron assisted her over the years with her exhibitions and teaching.
Sheila Smith, a British poet, included two poems she had written about Arnfield in "Woman Surprised by a Young Boy," a collection of poems by Smith which was published in July 2010 by Shoestring Press http://www.shoestring-press.com/2010/06/woman-surprised-by-a-young-boy/
The first poem, "Silence is Very Loud", refers to a visit Smith made to Arnfield's new studio after Arnfield's death, and to her old studio. The second, "Death of a Painter, for Marjorie" talks about Arnfield's unique vision, her ability to see in a landscape something that no-one else could see. The title of the collection, "Woman Surprised by a Young Boy," refers to a painting by the English artist Eileen Cooper
Eileen Cooper
Eileen Cooper is an English contemporary painter and printmaker, who makes stylised paintings of women or couples, often featuring unexpected animals...
.
Awards
She was awarded the MBEMBE
MBE can stand for:* Mail Boxes Etc.* Management by exception* Master of Bioethics* Master of Bioscience Enterprise* Master of Business Engineering* Master of Business Economics* Mean Biased Error...
in 2000, the year before her death, for her "services to art".
In 2002-2003, Ron Arnfield commissioned a professional photographer to scan much of her work, including her sketchbooks. A CD-ROM, Marjorie Arnfield, A Digital Library, was then produced. A website showcasing her work was also created, but this has now lapsed.
Death
She died on 26 April 2001 in Nottingham, aged 70. In keeping with her Christian faith, her funeral service took place at Southwell MinsterSouthwell Minster
Southwell Minster is a minster and cathedral, in Southwell, Nottinghamshire, England. It is six miles away from Newark-on-Trent and thirteen miles from Mansfield. It is the seat of the Bishop of Southwell and Nottingham and the Diocese of Southwell and Nottingham.It is considered an outstanding...
, Nottinghamshire
Nottinghamshire
Nottinghamshire is a county in the East Midlands of England, bordering South Yorkshire to the north-west, Lincolnshire to the east, Leicestershire to the south, and Derbyshire to the west...
. She was survived by her son, Robin.
Assessment
Of her commemorative exhibition at Nottingham University in July 2001, a review in The Times by Amber Cowan said it was among the five best one-person art exhibitions in the UK that month: "As a student in Sunderland in the Fifties, Arnfield made a series of oil sketches of miners gathering sea coal along the beach and tending their allotments. 30 years later, her bleak, desolate paintings of Nottinghamshire's doomed coalfields garnered her a reputation as one of the area's finest and most politically aware figurative painters. This retrospective also includes peaceful harbour scenes and hot Provencal landscapes painted in her later years."Of an exhibition by Arnfield at the Mowbray Gallery in Sunderland in October 1964, a review in The Guardian stated: "Apart from a series of broad, fell country watercolours held together by a lyrical and febrile line, Arnfield, with a brief, decorous and decorative look in gouache and oil at industry in Whitehaven and Tee-side, seems most readily at home when, in pen and wash, she follows in the tradition of Raoul Dufy
Raoul Dufy
Raoul Dufy[p] was a French Fauvist painter. He developed a colorful, decorative style that became fashionable for designs of ceramics and textiles, as well as decorative schemes for public buildings. He is noted for scenes of open-air social events...
and John Paddy Carstairs
John Paddy Carstairs
John Paddy Carstairs was a British film director and television director , usually of light-hearted subject matter. He was also a comic novelist and painter....
." The review also described Arnfield as a "realist painter with an obvious appeal."
Speaking of Arnfield's English Lake District painting Hodbarrow Iron Mines and Collapsed Seawall, Babette Decker wrote that the "... work of Marjorie Arnfield was one of the most exciting discoveries for my book – an artist who opened one's eyes to the beauty of subjects one might otherwise dismiss as ugly".
Marjorie Arnfield, A Celebration of her Life and Work, which was published after her death in 2001, described her pictures as "embodying a spirit of vitality, optimism and sheer 'aliveness to it all'". She also left many sketchbooks and diaries which combined extensive comments on her travels with illustrations of what she saw. In December 2009, the Durham County Local History Society featured a life of Marjorie Arnfield in Volume 6 of the Society's Durham Biographies.
In October 1958, one of Arnfield's paintings, Landscape, County Durham, was selected for the Northern Young Artists exhibition that took place in October-November 1958 at the Graves Art Gallery, Sheffield. The Manchester artist L.S. Lowry was honorary president of the Northern Young Artists at that time, and was one of three people on the selection board that chose Arnfield's painting. In its catalogue for the 1965 summer exhibition of Arnfield's Lake District
Lake District
The Lake District, also commonly known as The Lakes or Lakeland, is a mountainous region in North West England. A popular holiday destination, it is famous not only for its lakes and its mountains but also for its associations with the early 19th century poetry and writings of William Wordsworth...
paintings, the Netherhall Centre in Maryport, Cumbria, spoke of Arnfield's "appreciation of Cumbria's beauty and her up-to-date impressions of the industrial and social scene," which included a painting of the atomic power station at Sellafield.
Coal mining
In the early 1990s Arnfield was deeply affected by the demise of the British coal industry, following the government's decision to privatize British Coal, operator of the UK’s coal minesCoal mining
The goal of coal mining is to obtain coal from the ground. Coal is valued for its energy content, and since the 1880s has been widely used to generate electricity. Steel and cement industries use coal as a fuel for extraction of iron from iron ore and for cement production. In the United States,...
. She decided to capture through her art something of the power and history of the mining industry, which was once a major contributor to the British economy.
In Marjorie Arnfield: Artist's Statement, a document produced for an exhibition at Bishop Auckland
Bishop Auckland
Bishop Auckland is a market town and civil parish in County Durham in north east England. It is located about northwest of Darlington and southwest of Durham at the confluence of the River Wear with its tributary the River Gaunless...
Town Hall in 1999, Arnfield wrote that, prior to commencing her mining paintings, she turned to the writings of D. H. Lawrence
D. H. Lawrence
David Herbert Richards Lawrence was an English novelist, poet, playwright, essayist, literary critic and painter who published as D. H. Lawrence. His collected works represent an extended reflection upon the dehumanising effects of modernity and industrialisation...
, some of whose novels had been strongly influenced by the East Midlands coal mines. "The disappearance of the pits that Lawrence knew (following the demise of the British coal mining industry) led me to explore the use of archival photographs as a source material for my paintings of miners at work", Arnfield wrote.
In 1994, British Coal
British Coal
thumb|right|British Coal company logoThe British Coal Corporation was a nationalised corporation in the United Kingdom responsible for the extraction of coal...
sponsored Arnfield’s exhibition A Tribute to Coal Mining in Nottinghamshire at Nottingham University's Djanogly Art Gallery. She then held a further 20 exhibitions of her mining art under the title "Images of Coal" at museums and art galleries across the UK. In her mining paintings, Marjorie Arnfield focused on historical mining methods, social aspects of mining communities, and the demolition of the pits. Her mining paintings were purchased by private collections, museums and art galleries. Opening an exhibition of Arnfield's coal mining art at Woodhorn Colliery Museum, journalist Kate Adie
Kate Adie
Kathryn "Kate" Adie , OBE , is a British journalist. Her most high-profile role was that of chief news correspondent for BBC News, during which time she became well known for reporting from war zones around the world...
said "It is only through Marjorie's images that young people of future generations will learn about this once-great industry [of coal-mining]."
At an exhibition of her work in Sunderland in 1997, Arnfield commented, "Pitheads, coal-blackened miners returning home, men scavenging for sea coal on beaches remain as vivid memories from my childhood and art school days in the North-East." According to The Artists of Northumbria, Arnfield was one of the few British women artists to show a particular interest in the theme of coal mining.
In July 2007, the Public Catalogue Foundation
The Public Catalogue Foundation
The Public Catalogue Foundation, a registered charity, is working on a project to record the UK's complete collection of oil paintings in public ownership and to make this accessible to the public through a series of affordable catalogues and, at a later stage, free Internet access.The catalogues...
said it would include a photograph of Arnfield's Keep The Pits Open: Protest painting in its forthcoming Oil Paintings in Public Ownership: West Yorkshire catalogue. The painting itself is held in the National Coal Mining Museum for England in Wakefield
Wakefield
Wakefield is the main settlement and administrative centre of the City of Wakefield, a metropolitan district of West Yorkshire, England. Located by the River Calder on the eastern edge of the Pennines, the urban area is and had a population of 76,886 in 2001....
, West Yorkshire.
Examples of Marjorie Arnfield's coal mining art can be seen on the BBC's Your Paintings website, which is operated in partnership with the Public Catalogue Foundation http://www.bbc.co.uk/arts/yourpaintings/paintings/search/painted_by/marjorie-arnfield
Paintings on display
Paintings by Arnfield held in public galleries, as given by the Public Catalogue Foundation, September 2010:| Title | Date | Collection | Catalogue |
|---|---|---|---|
| Water Gardens, Westhorpe, Suffolk | 2002 | Southwell Town Council | Nottinghamshire |
| Bonnieuz Provence, France | Sherwood Forest Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust | Nottinghamshire | |
| Blue Flax | Sherwood Forest Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust | Nottinghamshire | |
| Miners and Dogs | Rotherham Museum & Art Gallery | South Yorkshire | |
| Save Our Pits | c.1995 | Rotherham Museum & Art Gallery | South Yorkshire |
| The last Shift | Nottinghamshire County Teaching Primary Care Trust | Nottinghamshire | |
| Desolation, Pleaseley Colliery, Nottinghamshire | Nottinghamshire County Teaching Primary Care Trust | Nottinghamshire | |
| Rufford Colliery Demolition | c.1993 | Nottinghamshire County Teaching Primary Care Trust | Nottinghamshire |
| Breaking the Coal (c.1920) | c.1993 | Nottinghamshire County Teaching Primary Care Trust | Nottinghamshire |
| Woodhorn Colliery Museum | Northumberland Collections Service | Northumberland, Tees Valley & Tyne and Wear | |
| Keep the Pits Open, Protest | National Coal Mining Museum for England | West Yorkshire | |
| Landscape, County Durham | Mima Middlesbrough Institute of Modern Art | Northumberland, Tees Valley & Tyne and Wear | |
| Conservatory, Blackhouse Park, Sunderland, Tyne and Wear | c.1950 | Southwell Town Council | Nottinghamshire |
| Industrial Landscape, Whitehaven | Sunderland Museum and Winter Gardens | Tyne and Wear Museums | |
| Cadaqués, Spain (1) | 2000 | University of Nottingham | Nottinghamshire |
Further reading
- Coal Faces Mining Lives. Portraits of an industry and its people, Imogen D. Townsend. The National Mining Museum for England Trust Ltd 2005. ISBN 1872925103
- Shafts of Light: Mining Art in the Great Northern Coalfield, Robert McManners and Gillian Wales, Gemini Productions, 2002. ISBN 978-0953221714
- The Artists of Northumbria, Marshall Hall, Art Dictionaries, Bristol, England, 2005. ISBN 0953260992
- Marjorie Arnfield, A Celebration of her Life and Work, Djanogly Art Gallery, Nottingham University, 2001. ISBN 1900809958
- St Ives Journey, Artists & Illustrators, September 2000, ISSN 02694697
- In Conversation, Marjorie Arnfield, The Artist, March 1999, ISSN 00043877
- Testament To Coal, Artists & Illustrators, October 1998, ISSN 02694697
- Marjorie Arnfield, National Coal Mining Museum for England, May 1998
- Marjorie Arnfield, Artist's Statement, written by the artist about her personal reasons for her mining art, and published for an exhibition at Bishop Auckland Town Hall, 1999.
- An Artist's Retreat, Woman and Home Magazine, February 1995
- Durham Biographies Volume 6, Durham County Historical Society, December 2009