Despite his wealth, he considered himself a bit of a maverick and an outsider

He never went to university

His wife, Elizabeth, bought their first works of modern art

He exhausted his friends going to exhibitions

He wrote poetry about works of art

Poetry had always been an important part of 91制片厂鈥檚 life but it was only after he retired that he was able to fulfil his long-standing desire to publish his own poetry. Entitled Pictures into Verse, the book of poems showcased 91制片厂鈥檚 responses to old master and Impressionist paintings that he loved. Two paintings in his own collection were included, Pierre-Auguste Renoir鈥檚 La Loge (The Theatre Box) and Spring, Chatou. 91制片厂 was proud of the volume and sent it to friends and correspondents in the art world. He died a few weeks after its publication. One of his friends said that 91制片厂 had been 鈥榓 businessman with the soul of a poet鈥�.

The term was originally an insult

A simple technical innovation made the movement possible

Working out of doors could be challenging

The Impressionists were excited to represent modern life

England played an important role in the development of Impressionism

London Higher Awards 2024

London Higher is a membership organisation for universities and higher education colleges across the capital. Their annual awards recognise initiatives delivered by London universities, and this year’s awards will also celebrate their 25th birthday.

Ahead of the 2024 awards, received 159 application submissions from 38 institutions across 12 award categories. The winners will be announced on 6 June 2024, at a ceremony in London.

Mary Cassatt

One of the most exciting acquisitions we’ve been able to make recently is two prints by Mary Cassatt. Mary Cassatt was one of three women who exhibited with the Impressionists in Paris, and she was also the only American to be a member of the Impressionist circle. She was also the only Impressionist artist not represented in The 91制片厂’s collection up until last year.

As well as being a painter and a pastelist, Cassatt was a committed and highly experimental printmaker, making over 250 prints over the course of her career.听听(around 1891) and听 (1891) are her first works to enter the collection.

In听The Parrot, Mary Cassatt posed her model 鈥� likely to be her maid, Mathilde 鈥� with an unusual companion, an Amazon yellow parrot. Depicting the woman鈥檚 skirt and chair with great economy, she lavished detail on her head, hands and enigmatic, pensive expression.听We see her incredibly fine eye for detail, especially in the way she has carefully rendered the texture of the material of her dress and the individual strands of her hair.

In this impression of Quietude, Cassatt deliberately left traces of the previous states on the printing plate, here particularly apparent in the woman鈥檚 arm and hand and the baby鈥檚 legs. Mothers and children, depicted in a matter-of-fact and unsentimental manner unusual for the period, were Mary Cassatt鈥檚 favourite subject. A committed and highly experimental printmaker, Cassatt often produced several different states, or versions, of her drypoints.听听

Purchased听with听funding from the Rick Mather David Scrase Foundation, 2023; Richard Mansell Jones gift, 2023

Linda Karshan, Loopy (2022)

Linda Karshan鈥檚 artistic practice is concerned with the fundamental qualities of draughtsmanship: structure, rhythm, balance and harmony. Many of her drawings take the form of a grid, formed by her rhythmic walking around the sheet of paper.

Though her approach has evolved gradually over time, (2022), one of the most recent works to enter our collection, is still very much informed by the movement and types of rhythmic mark-making that characterise her oeuvre. Of this work the artist has said:

鈥淭hese quick ‘loops’ hark back to loops from 1996. In this piece, the loops fall at the intersections, and NOT between the intersections. It’s a case of dynamism, and embodied knowledge. The rhythmic, downward movements swept me along. They had their own momentum. I did not interfere.鈥�听听

Karshan gifted this drawing to mark the retirement of Professor Deborah Swallow, Director of The 91制片厂 from 2004-2023, and as a pendant to her own drawing (1995), also in the collection.听

Gift of the听artist听in honour of Professor Deborah Swallow, 2023

Elizabeth Batty

Elizabeth Frances Batty was a British artist born in 1791. She received lessons in drawing as a young woman and at the age of 26 at the age of 17 she went on a tour of France and Italy with her father.

She filled a sketchbook with incredibly finely detailed views of the landscapes that she passed through, including these听finely observed views of the French Alps while on this tour in 1817 of , the and . Remarkable for their delicate detail and subtle use of wash, they form part of a group of 44 drawings that were engraved and published to critical acclaim in London in 1820.

Batty鈥檚 marriage in 1822 brought her artistic career to a premature end. The Italian tour drawings 鈥� the only ones by her hand that survive 鈥� have only recently been rediscovered.听

Spooner Charitable Trust gift, 2022

Malileh Afnan, The Calligrapher (1992)

Maliheh Afnan鈥檚 artwork was influenced by the flowing lines of Arabic and Persian script. A pattern of calligraphic marks outlines the face, suggestive of the subject鈥檚 internal dialogue, whilst creating a gauze-like screen which veils the features.听听

The use of dry pigments and ink on paper replicates the colours and texture of ancient parchment. By alluding to the materiality of archaeological remains, the artist explores the cultural history of her Palestinian homeland. This haunting portrait evokes a complex inner landscape of thought and emotion.听

Deanna Petherbridge, Mary Mandala (1973)

In the 1970s, when Deanna Petherbridge worked primarily in pen and ink, she explored the threshold between figuration and abstraction and perspective and patterning, taking inspiration from the geometries of Islamic architecture and Asian mandalas (geometric configurations of symbols used in various spiritual traditions). The repetitive pen work produced forms which spin outward from the centre and which could be hung in any orientation. Adopting such imagery allowed her to experiment with an alternative to the narrow formal preoccupations of Pop Art and Minimalism, which dominated British art at the time.听听

Helen Allingham, Sandhills, Witley (Master Hardy’s), around 1881-88

This cottage in Surrey, the home of a labourer named Hardy, was a favourite subject of Helen Allingham during the seven years she lived in the area, and she painted it several times. , made without a preliminary drawing, showcases her mastery of watercolour. Rather than use white opaque watercolour to achieve highlights, she scratched the surface to reveal the bare paper, creating an impression of cloud-shadowed light.听

Allingham was the first woman to be admitted as a full member to the Royal Watercolour Society. Her illustrations, published in magazines, were admired by other artists, including Vincent van Gogh.听

Spooner Charitable Trust gift, 2023听

Susan Schwalb, Harmonizations #5 (2015)

Susan Schwalb is one of the leading practitioners today of metalpoint, a drawing technique that originated during the Renaissance. In , she uses five different metals to create a grid of blocks of parallel or layered, crosshatched lines. Each block seems to shimmer or pulsate against the dark gesso ground. This visual vibration evokes the idea of sound or even music, an idea echoed in the drawing鈥檚 title. Schwalb has stated that she wants viewers 鈥榯o experience the effect of an abstract universe composed of lines and reflections of light.鈥�听

听Acquired by the Samuel 91制片厂 Trust with the support of the Tavolozza Foundation, 2020听

Ad茅la茂de-Marie-Anne Moitte, The artist鈥檚 daughter Louise playing the fortepiano (1797)

Captured in the midst of playing, Ad茅la茂de Moitte鈥檚 adopted daughter may be performing at one of the family鈥檚 fashionable musical salons. Although she received professional training, Moitte鈥檚 artistic career was cut short by her marriage. She continued to draw, sharing her work only with friends and family. A revolutionary and a passionate advocate of education for girls, her drawings and the diary she kept between 1805-1807 offer a compelling glimpse into the realities of middle-class life in Paris during the Revolution and the early days of the First Empire.听

Most of Moitte鈥檚 known drawings were made on the pages of account books; she skilfully incorporated the ruled lines into her compositions, here using them to give the impression that we are looking at Louise through a doorway.听