Ford Madox Brown & the Victorian Imagination Workshop

Ford Madox Brown & the Victorian Imagination Workshop

Northumbria University, Newcastle-upon-Tyne, Friday 9 November 2012
Venue: Squires Building, Rm 210; 12.30 am – 5.15 pm

Is Ford Madox Brown the most misunderstood and under-appreciated of all the great Victorian artists? During the artist’s lifetime his works were defined by critics as chaotic, confusing, disturbing, lacking unity or unsophistication. Ruskin reckoned that Brown’s obsessive vision explained an art that drained life from the things it represented. This ‘traditional’ view dominated until the 1980s when many ‘new’ art historians began to use key works by Brown to address Victorian attitudes to social topics. This workshop brings together fresh research on Brown’s critical aspirations and artistic achievements underpinned by an appreciation for Brown’s romantic critique of academic culture and subscription to a belief in art’s depiction or embodiment of the full richness and particularity of human experience.

Schedule

12.30  Introduction & Welcome

12.40  Paul Barlow (Northumbria) 'Brown’s Hogarth'

13.10  Colin Trodd (Manchester) 'Ford Madox Brown and the William Blake Brotherhood'

13.40 Colin Cruise (Aberystwyth) 'Composing meanings: space and invention in Ford Madox Brown’s paintings, 1843-55'

14.10 Break

14.30  Elizabeth Prettejohn (York) 'Ford Madox Brown and History Painting'

15.00  Nicholas Tromans (Kingston) 'Drawing Teeth: Reflections on Brown’s Mouths'

15.30  Matthew Potter (Northumbria) 'Ford Madox Brown as Art Teacher'

16.00  Roundtable Discussion: Manchester Art Gallery Exhibition: 'Ford Madox Brown: Pre-Raphaelite Pioneer'

16:45 Open Session

17.15 End

There is no registration fee but spaces at the workshop are limited so please email matthew.potter@northumbria.ac.uk to reserve a place.