Grafton Galleries

Manet and the Post-Impressionists. Plakat für die Ausstellung in den Londoner Grafton Galleries 1910.

John Lavery (1856–1941) Die Krocket Partie, 1893.

Die Grafton Galleries war eine historisch bedeutsame, privat finanzierte Kunstgalerie in London, die von 1893 bis etwa 1930 existierte. Die Galerie wurde am 15. Januar 1893 in der Grafton Street 8 im Londoner Stadtteil Mayfair eröffnet und zog 1896 in die Bond Street im Herzen des Londoner West End um. Die Räumlichkeiten bestanden aus vier miteinander verbundenen Sälen und galten als luxuriös, modern und gut beleuchtet, was die Grafton Galleries zu einem beliebten Ort im Zentrum des Londoner Kunstlebens machte.

Geschichte

The Long Gallery at the Grafton Galleries, aus: The Opening of the New Grafton Galleries, Graphic, 25. Februar 1893

Die Galerie wurde 1891 als Grafton Galleries Co Ltd gegründet, um Kunstwerke auszustellen und gleichzeitig als Veranstaltungsort für Konzerte, Empfänge und gesellschaftliche Anlässe zu dienen. Sie diente auch als Kunsthalle, in der zahlreiche Wechselausstellungen verschiedener Künstlervereinigungen stattfanden. So nutzten unter anderem die Arts and Crafts Exhibition Society, die Royal Society of Portrait Painters, der Ridley Art Club, die Society of Miniaturists, die International Society of Sculptors, Painters and Graveurs (ISSPG) und der Women’s International Art Club (WIAC) die Räumlichkeiten der Galerie.

Die Grafton Galleries wurden durch bedeutende Ausstellungen bekannt. 1905 organisierte der Pariser Kunsthändler Paul Durand-Ruel hier die erste große Ausstellung impressionistischer Kunst in London. 1910 und 1912 organisierte der britische Kunstkritiker und Künstler Roger Fry die bahnbrechenden Post-Impressionismus-Ausstellungen, die Werke von Künstlern wie Paul Cézanne, Vincent van Gogh (8 Gemälde), Paul Gauguin, Henri Matisse und Pablo Picasso einem breiten Publikum vorstellten. Diese Ausstellungen erregten großes Aufsehen und kontroverse Reaktionen in der Londoner Kunstwelt und trugen wesentlich zum Ruhm der Grafton Galleries bei.

Zwischen 1916 und 1920 war die Galerie Schauplatz der jährlichen Ausstellungen der Allied Artists' Association (AAA), einer von Frank Rutter initiierten Vereinigung nach dem Vorbild der französischen Société des Artistes Indépendants, die auf dem Prinzip der juryfreien Ausstellung beruhte.

Zu den Künstlern, die dort Einzel- oder Gruppenausstellungen hatten, gehörten Frank Brangwyn, Christopher Nevinson, Ben Nicholson, Glyn Philpot, Frank Salisbury, John Singer Sargent, William Bruce Ellis Ranken, William Orpen, John Lavery, James Jebusa Shannon und Fiddes Watts.

Die Kunstausstellungen wurden von zum Teil sehr umfangreichen und aufwändig gestalteten Ausstellungskatalogen begleitet.

Die letzte Ausstellung fand 1930 statt. Danach wurde die Galerie geschlossen und das Gebäude in einen Jazzclub und ein Kabarett umgewandelt.

Ausstellungsliste

• 1893: Februar: First exhibition, consisting of paintings and sculpture, by British and foreign artists of the present day
• 1893: Mai: Second exhibition, consisting of the third exhibition of the Society of Portrait Painters, by British and foreign artists of the present day

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  Paul Gauguin, Poèmes barbares, 1896. Fogg Art Museum, Cambridge, Massachusetts

  1893: November–Dezember: First exhibition of French artists in decorative art
• 1894: Fair women, loan exhibition of English portraits
• 1894: Fourth exhibition of Grafton Gallery, including a retrospective exhibition of work of Albert Moore, and a general collection of British and foreign works
• 1895: Winter exhibition of the works of old Scottish portrait painters, with a selection of the pictures of John Thomson of Duddingston and a collection of old Scottish silver and weapons
• 1895: Fair children, loan exhibition of English portraits
• 1896: Sixth exhibition of the Society of Portrait Painters
• 1896: Pictures representing the loss of Sir John Franklin's expedition to the North Pole, painted by Julius von Payer
• 1896: Januar–März: A loan collection of modern pictures, chiefly of the Barbizon and Dutch schools, with a collection of 200 original drawings by Paul Renouard and others
• 1896: April: Charles Sedelmeyer's fine art exhibition
• 1897: Exhibition of dramatic and musical art
• 1897: Society of Miniaturists exhibition
• 1897: Seventh exhibition of the Society of Portrait Painters
• 1897: Sommerausstellung of members' work, Society of Miniaturists
• 1897: Januar: Exhibition of the works of Ford Madox Brown

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  Als ein Gemälde von El Greco, ausgestellt in den Grafton Galleries, London (1909–1910)

  1898: Catalogue of pictures which belong to 68, Princes Gate
• 1898: Collection of pictures by Old Masters formed by David Sellar
• 1898: The Gentlewoman photographic competition, exhibition of prize pictures
• 1898: Eighth exhibition of the Society of Portrait Painters
• 1898: April–Mai: Exhibition of Australian Art in London
• 1898: Juni: Bibliotheca Lindesiana, manuscripts and examples of metal and ivory bindings exhibited to the Bibliographical Society, from the Earl of Crawford's collection
• 1899: Siegfried Bing, 1838–1905
• 1899: Januar: Vasily Vereshchagin exhibition: Napoleon I, 1812, from a sketch made by an eye-witness
• 1899: Oktober–Dezember: Exhibition of modern French art, with a representative collection of the artistic work of Louis Tiffany, of New York
• 1900: Fourteenth exhibition of the Ridley Art Club
• 1900: Ninth exhibition of the Society of Portrait Painters
• 1900: Sommer: Exhibition of a special selection from the works by George Romney, including a few portraits of Emma, Lady Hamilton by other artists

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  Alonso Sanchez Coello (1531 oder 1532–1588 zugeschrieben): Dame im Pelzmantel ca. 1577–1579. Pollok House, Glasgow

  1900: Dezember: Exhibition of a second selection from the works by George Romney, including a few portraits of Emma, Lady Hamilton, by other artists
• 1901: Exhibition of South African pictures by R. Gwelo Goodman
• 1901: Exhibition of works by Willi Wolf Rudinoff (an alias of Wilhelm Morgenstern), including examples in oil, water-colour, etching, and dry point
• 1901: März–April: Women's International Art Club, second annual exhibition
• 1902: Exhibition of the works of Emil Fuchs
• 1902: Works by the late Archibald Stuart Wortley, founder and president of the Society of Portrait Painters
• 1902: Portraits by the late Benjamin Constant, and one hundred pencil studies by Violet Manners, Marchioness of Granby
• 1902: März: Women's International Art Club, third annual exhibition
• 1902: November: Works by Emil Fuchs, the designer of the King Edward VII Coronation Medal and the King's head on the new postage stamps
• 1903: Januar: Women's International Art Club, fourth annual exhibition
• 1903: März: Modern Celtic ornament as applied to gold and silver plate, pewter, jewelry, carpets, garden pottery, sundials, etc.
• 1903: Mai: Bijoux et objets d'art exposés par M. René Lalique
• 1903: Mai–Juli: French masters exhibition
• 1904: Januar: Women's International Art Club, fifth annual exhibition
• 1904: Dezember: Women's International Art Club, sixth annual exhibition
• 1905: Januar–Februar: Pictures by Eugène Boudin, Paul Cézanne, Edgar Degas, Édouard Manet, Claude Monet, Berthe Morisot, Camille Pissarro, Pierre-Auguste Renoir, and Alfred Sisley, exhibited by Paul Durand-Ruel and Sons, from Paris
• 1905: Annual exhibition of the Society of Miniaturists
• 1905: März: Exhibition by Emil Fuchs
• 1905: Mai: Exhibition of a selection from the collection of the late James Staats Forbes, including a few works by Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot, Charles-François Daubigny, Narcisse Virgilio Díaz, Jean-François Millet, Jozef Israëls, Anton Mauve, one of the Maris brothers, and other artists
• 1905: Dezember: Women's International Art Club, seventh annual exhibition
• 1906: Munich fine art exhibition
• 1906: Januar: Eighth exhibition of the Arts and Crafts Exhibition Society
• 1906: Juli: International Congress of Architects in London
• 1906: Dezember: Women's International Art Club, eighth annual exhibition
• 1907: Exhibition of paintings and sketches of the Polar regions by Aleksandr Borisov of St. Petersburg
• 1907: Exhibition of works by members of the Société des aquarellistes français and the Société des peintres de la marine
• 1907: November–Dezember: Special exhibition, United Arts Club
• 1908: Januar: Women's International Art Club, ninth annual exhibition
• 1908: Februar–März: Fourth exhibition of the United Arts Club
• 1908: April: Indian princes, Kew Gardens, Italian landscapes, and other pictures
• 1908: Mai–Juli: Exhibition of paintings by Joaquín Sorolla y Bastida
• 1908: Oktober–November: The Franco-British Art Association, joint exhibition of Frits Thaulow, Hippolyte Camille Delpy, Arsène Chabanian
• 1908: Dezember: Georges Petit of Paris, second annual London salon of original etchings
• 1908: Pictures and drawings in the National Loan Exhibition in aid of the National Gallery Funds
• 1910: April–Mai: Tenth Annual Exhibition of the International Society of Sculptors, Painters and Gravers
• 1910: Mai–Juni: Exhibition of Fair Women; International Society of Sculptors, Painters and Gravers

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  Vincent van Gogh: Feld mit Schwertlilien bei Arles, 1888. Van Gogh Museum, Amsterdam.

  1910: Manet and the Post-Impressionists
• 1911: April–Mai: Eleventh Annual Exhibition of the International Society of Sculptors, Painters and Gravers
• 1911: Juni–Juli: A Century of Art, 1810–1910
• 1912: April–Mai: Twelfth Annual Exhibition of the International Society of Sculptors, Painters and Gravers
• 1912: Juni–Juli: Exhibition of Fair Children

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  Roger Fry: The Matisse Room, Zweite post-impressionistische Ausstellung in den Grafton Galleries, London, 1912

  1912/13: November–Januar 1913: Second Post-Impressionist Exhibition
• 1913/14: Oktober–Juni: Old Spanish Masters
• 1914: Oktober–Dezember: Modern Spanish Art
• 1917: Juli–August: Canadian Battle Pictures (second exhibition)
• 1921: April–Mai: The Annual Exhibition of the International Society of Sculptors, Painters and Gravers; Twenty-seventh London Exhibition
• 1922: April–Mai: The Annual Exhibition of the International Society of Sculptors, Painters and Gravers; Twenty-eighth London Exhibition

Literatur

• Illustrated catalogue of the exhibition of Spanish old masters in support of National Gallery funds and for the benefit of the Sociedad de Amigos del Arte Española, Oct. 1913 to Jan. 1914.
• Pamela Fletcher and Anne Helmreich (Hrsg.); The Rise of the Modern Art Market in London, 1850–1939. Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2012.
• Manet and the Post-Impressionists (Reprint). Forgotten Books, 2022.
• Catalogue of the pictures and drawings in the national loan exhibition, in aid of National Gallery funds : Held in the Grafton Galleries, London. Forgotten Books, 2022
• Barrie Bullen: Post-Impressionists in England – The Critical Reception. Taylor & Francis Group, Oxford, 2024.

Weblinks

• Illustrated catalogue of the exhibition of Spanish old masters in support of National Gallery funds and for the benefit of the Sociedad de Amigos del Arte Española, Oct. 1913 to Jan. 1914
• ArtBlogs: Grafton Galleries
• The Frick Collection "Second Post-Impressionist Show"
• Anne Helmreich: The Socio-Geography of Art Dealers and Commercial Galleries in Early Twentieth-Century London
• exhibitionculture