Collection: The Holburne Museum

Collection-level records:

• Collection overview (Cornucopia)

  Fine Art Collection

  The collection has a strong representation of 16th to 18th century Flemish, Dutch and Italian painting, and early 18th to early 19th century British painting. Among the British painters are Raeburn, Ramsay, Romney, Stubbs, Zoffany and Gainsborough, who spent 16 formative years in Bath. The paintings collection is particularly rich in portraiture and genre, but also contains religious subjects and a small important group of Dutch Italianate landscapes. Notable pieces include ‘Dr Rice Charleton’ by Thomas Gainsborough (1727-1788), oil on canvas, c.1764; ‘Reverend Robert Carter Thelwall and his family’ by George Stubbs (1724-1806), oil on panel, signed and dated 1776; and ‘Rosamund Sargent’ by Allan Ramsay (1713-1784), oil on canvas, signed and dated 1749. The collection of watercolours and drawings is comparatively less significant, but includes a landscape by Gainsborough and ‘View of Pembroke Castle’ by J M W Turner, as well as substantial groups of drawings by Sir George Clausen and Sylvia Gosse. The important collection of miniatures includes 16th and 17th century Flemish, German and Italian examples, but is substantially representative of the 18th century British school, containing a number of Bath-based artists. There are miniatures in watercolour and enamel, as well as silhouettes, and a rare group of 17th century portraits by Thomas Forster of notabilities in plumbago (black lead) on vellum. Bath connections are well represented by Angelica Kauffmann’s (1766-1808) portrait, c.1777, of 11-year-old Henrietta Laura Pulteney, heiress to the Early of Bath; Richard Cosway’s portrait of Elizabeth Linley; and Nathaniel Hone’s (1718-1784) miniature in enamel of Beau (Richard) Nash (1674-1762), signed and dated 1750. Sculpture is chiefly represented by small bronzes ranging from antique to Italian and French 16th to 19th century pieces. and including Far Eastern examples. Amongst the post-classical pieces is one piece of outstanding quality, ‘Woman Bathing’, c.1580, by Susini. An important marble group, ‘Diana and Endymion’ by Joseph Plura made in Bath in 1752, was purchased in 1997. The important fine art collection is a strength of the museum.

  Subjects

  Watercolours; Sculpture; Paintings; Art and Design; Fine Art; Drawings; Prints

  British Portraits

  Seventeenth-century and eighteenth-century British portraits from the collection of Sir William Holburne (1793-1874) and later gifts including works by Cornelius Jonson, Allan Ramsay, Thomas Gainsborough and George Stubbs. Portraits relating to C18 Bath acquired by the Holburne Museum, including works by Angelica Kauffman, Henry Walton and Bath artists William Tate, Thomas Beach, Thomas Barker and William Hoare. The collection includes long-term loans of important Bath-period works by Gainsborough, most notably The Byam Family. The Museum also has a small group of C18 pastel portraits, and about 200 portrait miniatures and silhouettes, mostly C18 and early C19, with an outstanding group of 12 plumbago (graphite) drawings c.1700 by Thomas Forster, and works by the all the principal Bath miniaturists of the Georgian period, including Jagger, Daniel, Rosenberg, Spornberg and Humphry. A small group of miscellaneous portrait drawings, including early C20 studies by George Clausen and Oswald Sickert. The Holburne Museum has recently received the Frank Brown collection, a legacy of prints and drawings related to music and theatre in C18-19 Bath, most of them portraits. Since the initiation of the Holburne Contemporary Portrait Prize in 2001, the Holburne has been commissioning a series of new portraits by local artists, choosing sitters from among people who have been influential in the cultural life of the South West.

  Decorative and Applied Art Collection

  The silver collection is the most significant of the decorative art collections. It contains a wide range of 17th to early 19th century English and Irish domestic silver and a strong representation of 17th century continental silver-gilt pieces. Notable items include a Jacobean bell salt of 1613 and a large group of 16th and 17th century Apostle and seal top spoons. The ceramic collection is particularly rich in 18th century British porcelain, including fine and representative examples from Chelsea, Bow, Longton Hall, Worcester, Derby, Swansea, Plymouth and Bristol. The collection also contains a good representation of porcelain figures, notably Chelsea, Bow and Derby. Notable items are some 40 pieces of 15th to 17th century Italian maiolica including a dish of c.1480 from Siena or Deruta. It is tin glazed earthenware with a scene of Diana and Actaeon within an Italian inscription. There is also a strong group of early Meissen including a rare and fine bottle and cover c.1724-5, hard paste porcelain painted in underglaze blue: stopper mounted in silver. The silver and ceramic collections are the major strengths of the decorative art collections. An important addition to the decorative art collections was the acquisition in 1972 of Edwardian and Victorian items from the Handley-Read collection. It includes furniture by Bath cabinetmakers and fine pottery, porcelain and silver. The glass collection is substantially English and Irish 18th to early 19th century table glass, but includes 17th century Bohemian glass. Furniture is represented by a good collection of chiefly English pieces from the late 17th century to the early 19th century. There is a collection of seals and cameos ranging in date from Roman to Renaissance to 18th and 19th century examples.

  Subjects

  Ceramics; Metalwork; Decorative and Applied Arts; Art and Design; Silver

  Archaeology Collection

  This small collection chiefly comprises Roman glass, seals and cameos.

  Subjects

  Archaeology

  Medals Collection

  There is a collection of mainly British medals of 17th to early 19th century date.

  Subjects

  Medals

  Numismatics Collection

  The coins are mainly British and chiefly date from the 17th to the early 19th centuries.

  Subjects

  Numismatics

  Music Collection

  There are a few interesting musical instruments, notably a fortepiano of c.1795 by Johann Schantz of Vienna; a harp by Sebastian Erard of 1802; and a Steinway piano once owned by Rachmaninov.

  Subjects

  Music

  Costume and Textile Collection

  This collection is largely from the British Isles. It includes several fine pieces of 17th century embroidery; excellent examples of raised or stumpwork; a collection of 18th and 19th century baby clothes; and a small group of fans.

  Subjects

  Costume and Textile

  Other

  Archives; Costume and Textile; Ethnography; Maritime; Medicine; Photography

  Source: Cornucopia

  Date: Not known, but before 2015

  Licence: CC BY-NC