Fylde Gallery

Fylde Gallery

Richard Ansdell paintings

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Lytham St Annes Art Collection

The Lytham St Annes Art Collection

The Lytham St Annes Art Collection began in 1925 when John Booth (1899 – 1941), son of E H Booth who founded the local grocery business, presented to St Annes Town Council a painting by Richard Ansdell RA entitled ‘The Herd Lassie’, 1876. The lovely picture below records the event.

It was significant that the gift was a painting by Richard Ansdell (1815 - 1885), a very accomplished Victorian artist and Royal Academician who lived and worked in the area between Lytham and St Annes and which subsequently became known as Ansdell.

It is believed to be the only place in the country named after an artist.

Many pictures and works of art were donated over the years following John Booth’s generous gift, the most notable donor being Alderman James Herbert Dawson JP(1867 – 1963) who gave his first picture to the Collection in 1931, the ‘Partridge Shooting’, 1879, another painting by Richard Ansdell RA. Over the next thirty years Alderman Dawson gave more than fifty paintings and objets d’art, more than any other donor. He also gave what was to become the star of the Collection and its most valuable painting, Fuseli’s beautiful, ‘Vision of Catherine of Aragon’, first exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1781. It had been on loan to the Collection for the previous twenty years when it was withdrawn by the family in 1950 to be sold. Not wanting to lose this wonderful picture, Alderman Dawson bought it and gave it back.

There are over 200 paintings, sculptures and other works of art in the Lytham St Annes Art Collection and selections from it can now be seen at various times of the year in The Fylde Gallery. This lovely gallery can be found in Booths Lytham store in Haven Road where, in 2007, Booths built their new local branch and incorporated within it an art gallery specifically so that the Art Collection, which the son of their founder started over eighty years ago, could be displayed for everyone to see and enjoy. ‘The Herd Lassie’ can always be seen on display in there.

The next opportunity to see a selection of works from the Collection will be an Exhibition entitled :
“Treasures of the Lytham St Annes Art Collection” - May 31 – July 25 2012 at the Fylde Gallery, Booths, Lytham, which promises to be the most exciting and varied exhibition of the Collection yet.  As well as paintings there will be some sculpture and a selection of Chinese ivories on view.  The largest and most valuable painting to be on show will be “The Vision of Catherine of Aragon” by  Henry Fuseli, R.A. a Swiss-born artist who came to reside in England in 1763. It depicts a scene from Act IV of Shakespeare’s King Henry VIII with Queen Catherine dreaming, attended by Patience, her handmaiden, and Griffith, her gentleman usher.  Oil on canvas, the painting measures 58  x 83 inches.

The exhibition at the Fylde Gallery is admission free.