Tissot’s Blue Plaque Unveiling in Ramsgate

 This is a case of right place, wrong building as the Royal Albion Hotel where Tissot painted his pictures was demolished in the late 1800s to make way for Madeira Walk.

The pictures of the unveiling are here http://www.michaelsbookshop.com/laptop811/id13.htm

Ramsgate Art cheating a bit of a ramble about local art.

What with Ramsgate’s Summer Squall arts festival being on this weekend, Tissot’s blue plaque being unveiled on Pizza Express and the Turner Contemporary shortening its hours – I believe they are soon to ban photography too – although this may be temporary and to do Rodin’s or Emin’s rude bits, I though I should do some sort of art post.

As some of you may remember I did a certain amount of research about where Tissot did his Ramsgate paintings, mainly to make sure the blue plaque went in the right place, see http://thanetonline.blogspot.com/search/label/James%20Tissot

What with it being unveiled on Sunday and all of the art experts being about for the art festival I thought I ought to go over my work and check it for errors, bunging Tissot and Ramsgate into Google and clicking on the image tab the picture above came up, if you click on it and enlarge it you will see that looking out of the window the lighthouse is on the wrong pier.

This is a mirror image of the print

Looking at the other pictures, that Tissot did of Ramsgate this raises some interesting questions, the source of the top image is The British Museum and I am wondering if the print they bought, they say about 100 years ago is a fake.

It isn’t unusual for prints to come out as mirror images as essentially what the artist is doing is scratching a sketch onto the printing plate, however a lot of artists overcome this mirror image problem drawing the picture on paper first and then transferring the image, with soap or something onto the plate before scratching it on. This means that the eventual printed image is the right way out.

 As you can see from this print and painting, this is how it was normally done.

The British Museum bought this print in 1923 and it is supposed to be a drypoint engraved by Tissot however it doesn’t look quite right to me. But I keep coming back to the picture being back to front. Presumably a lot of people who knew Ramsgate would have bought the print and noticed it was a mirror image, Tissot was very professional all rather strange.   


I will ramble on about this if I get a chance.  

Tissot Revised and the Blue Plaques for Ramsgate.

This is another question about art this time it is unquestionably art, the question however is where that art took place, after my post about this last Saturday see http://thanetonline.blogspot.com/2010/02/tissot-ramsgate-passing-storm-blue.html there has been a certain about of debate about where Tissot painted his pictures of Ramsgate from.

I can only say that I am afraid I was mistaken in my previous post when I said it was the Castle Hotel and that it was in fact The Royal Albion Hotel, this was the building – now demolished – that stood on the site of the building where Pizza Express is now and was purpose built to house The National Westminster Bank.

Several things worried me about my previous assumption, one being that Tissot was unlikely to reproduce the same artistic license over the shape of the windows in several paintings and drawings.

Another was would have stayed at The Castle when he could have stayed at The Royal Albion Hotel or The Royal Hotel?

Another was the position of the Police Office and the Harbour Trustees Committee House on the other side of the road, shouldn’t part of theses have shown up in the pictures.

Anyway the pictures say it all really, right windows, unobstructed view and right class of hotel.

Click on the link for some more http://www.michaelsbookshop.com/Blogpicts1210/id23.htm

Tissot Ramsgate, A Passing Storm, blue plaques and local history.

As some of you are probably aware the Ramsgate Society is involved in a scheme to put up blue plaques on buildings in Ramsgate to commemorate famous peoples associations with the town.

James Tissot painted at least two paintings in Ramsgate from a room overlooking the harbour and I think I have narrowed this down to The Castle Hotel.

There are a number of factors here, the height of the balcony relative to the harbour and the angle of the views pretty much has to make it Harbour Parade, the shallow bay windows, the distinctive balcony railings, the distinctive wooden sunshade beneath the roof of the balcony and the absence of any other similar building in the right place.

The link takes you to some old photographs of Harbour Parade http://www.michaelsbookshop.com/Blogpicts1210/id17.htm I think it quite likely that my deductions here may lead to a blue plaque, so any corrections would be much appreciated.

Ramsgate's answer to Turner and Tracey

As the new Turner centre plans have been revealed I thought it appropriate to feature Bob Simmonds book Ramsgate's answer to Turner and Tracey if it interests you click here for some of the books content.

The publicity and controversy generated by the proposed Turner Centre at Margate, and the recent book and film about Tracey Emin's childhood there, have given the impression that these are the only famous artists ever to have lived in Thanet. This book attempts to correct this by looking at the many artistic, creative and significant people who have lived in the neighbouring town of Ramsgate.

The first chapter provides information about the local connections of a whole range of people - from Saint Augustine to Jackie 'Mr. TV' Pallo and from Karl Marx to Frank Muir - with lengthy looks at Queen Victoria's childhood visits and the holiday stays of Marx and Engels.

The significant local figure of Sir William Curtis, his relationship with George IV, and his influential role in the transportation of convicts to Australia, is then examined, with new research from Australia which casts the great Baronet in a less than favourable light.

A chapter is devoted to each of the more well-known artists who have worked in Ramsgate, including William Frith, James Tissot, Vincent Van Gough, Sir Joshua Reynolds, and the Pugins - with reproductions of their local pictures where possible, and a humorous modern-day version where not.

The architectural remains of the fishing industry, and of the army's presence in the town during the Napoleonic wars, provide an insight into these two periods, and extracts from the letters of an army officer's wife give an interesting glimpse into the social whirl that made Ramsgate very fashionable at that time.

A stroll along the eastern cliff is provided in order to look at places where other notable people have lived whilst in the town. These include Albion Place (visited by Queen Victoria and Jane Austen), Wellington Crescent and the Plains of Waterloo (Coleridge, Marx, Frith, Collins), the site of Truro Lodge (Professor Samuel Vince FRS), the Granville and San Clu Hotels (various), and East Lodge (Queen Caroline, Lord Keith, Duke of Wellington, Moses Montefiore etc,), and the latter's mausoleum and synagogue.

The book ends with details of other books, websites and organisations that can provide more information about the characters mentioned.