Sheffield Museums

*Sheffield Central Library on Surrey Street is also home to Graves Art Gallery. Photograph: DJP/2021.*

You’ve probably seen the Bowmer & Kirkland signs on hoardings and cranes around Sheffield. The Derbyshire-based construction and development company is responsible for Moor Market, No.3 St. Paul’s Place, St. Vincent’s Place, New Era Square, and is backing the developer behind the West Bar scheme.

The company was established in 1923 as a partnership between joiner Alfred Bowmer and bricklayer Robert William Kirkland. The current chairman is Jack Kirkland, businessman, art collector and philanthropist.

*Bowmer & Kirkland was founded in 1923 and is based at Heage, near Belper, Derbyshire. Photograph: Bowmer & Kirkland.*

Kirkland first started buying art around 20 years ago, purchasing a work by the US conceptual sculptor Tom Friedman. While big on American modernism and Latin American contemporary art, his collection also includes Hellenistic bronzes, a Carracci portrait, and an Egyptian faience baboon.

His sizeable collection of interwar European photography is promised to the Tate, where he is Co-Chair of its Photography Acquisitions Committee. He is also the chairman of Nottingham Contemporary and a trustee of the Bridget Riley Art Foundation.

Kirkland is also chairman and settlor of The Ampersand Foundation, a UK-awarding charity that supports the visual arts, exhibitions, projects, and supporting public collections, provided they are free to the public at least one day per week.

*Jack Kirkland’s art collection has been loaned for international exhibitions, and some of the works have been previously shown at Graves Gallery in Sheffield. Photograph: Apollo Magazine.*

Last Friday (3 Sep 2021), the Graves Art Gallery in Sheffield reopened after six months of renovation work to redecorate, re-clad the walls in galleries largely untouched since 1934, bring many artworks out of storage for new displays, and to showcase work with a fresh perspective on classic art.

It has all been possible after a grant of £455,000 from the Ampersand Foundation, a long-time backer of Sheffield Museums, and the largest single amount ever awarded by the charity.

The grant echoes the day when Sheffield Central Library and Graves Art Gallery were opened by the Duchess of York (Queen Mother to our younger readers) in July 1934.

The newly reclad and redecorated temporary exhibition space, galleries 2 and 3, will reopen with an exhibition celebrating the work of sculptor Mark Firth, great, great grandson of steel magnate and philanthropist Mark Firth. Photograph: Sheffield Museums.

The total cost of the building was estimated at £141,700, of which £114,700 represented the structure, and £27,000 the furnishing. Alderman John George Graves contributed £30,000 and gave the gallery’s director, Dr J.M. Rothenstein, unrestricted choice from his own art collection, with power to borrow whatever was needed.

*John Rothenstein was born in London in 1901, the son of Sir William Rothenstein, whose family was connected to the Bloomsbury Set. Photograph: Geni.*

Sir John Knewstub Maurice Rothenstein CBE (1901–1992) had served as Director of Leeds City Art Gallery, and was appointed Director of Sheffield City Art Galleries (1932-38) where he oversaw the establishment and opening of the Graves Art Gallery. From 1938–64 Rothenstein was Director of the Tate Gallery in London.

Rothenstein carefully planned the interior which was of dark blue rough-textured paper, to take advantage of each collection in its eight galleries.

It’s been a long road since, overshadowed by recent events in which the Central Library and Graves Art Gallery were almost sold to become a five-star hotel, and the fact that it needs about £30m investment in maintenance.

Kim Streets was appointed to the role of CEO of Museums Sheffield (now Sheffield Museums)in 2012. She is seen here at Graves Art Gallery before the reopening to the public. Photograph: Sheffield Telegraph.

The gallery has not had a major redisplay and some of the spaces were in desperate need of a refresh.

The project began back in the winter with the removal of the artworks from the gallery walls, allowing skilled contractors to re-clad galleries 2, 3 and 6. The contractors removed the existing wall cladding before fixing new sheets of MDF to create smooth walls – a first in decades for these galleries.

The final phase of the improvements was the installation of new MDF walls and woodwork, that were then painted and finished ready for the new displays.

Top layer of the walls coming away to reveal vertical wooden planks. These planks had been covered in hessian many decades ago and the hessian had then been covered with layers and layers of paint over the years. Photograph: Sheffield Museums.

*A set of signatures by the original builders of the Central Library and Graves Art Gallery, which opened in 1934. Photograph: Sheffield Museums.*

*Refurbishment and re-hanging nears completion as Graves Art Gallery gets ready to reopen to the public. Photograph: Sheffield Telegraph.*

It is understood that the Ampersand Foundation will be supporting the Graves Art Gallery with further redisplays, conservation of the city’s art collection, work with schools and artists, and more over the next four years,

Jack Kirkland, the charity’s chairman, says Sheffield Museums is “using the money as it was intended to be used: that is for the benefit of all Sheffield residents and visitors, and in particular children and young people”.

I might suggest that J.G. Graves would have approved.

*A fresh new look for Graves Art Gallery. Photograph: Sheffield Telegraph.*

*A rare survivor of Georgian Sheffield. Brick with pedimented Doric doorcase and a big-canted bay window, that was added in the early 19th century. Picture: DJP/2021*

Realistically, Leader House, overlooking Arundel Gate, from Surrey Street, should not be here anymore. In 1938, Sheffield Corporation bought it with intention of demolition, using the site as part of an ambitious plan to build a new College of Arts and Crafts. The plans were postponed because of World War Two and the Georgian House survived.

A similar thing happened in the 1970s, when Leader House (along with the Lyceum Theatre, the Education Offices and Gladstone Buildings) all came under threat of demolition. In 1970, an application was made to the Minister of Housing for Listed Building Consent to replace it with a modern circular register office. After a public enquiry permission was refused, and the infamous ‘wedding cake’ was built elsewhere.

Leader House was built by the Duke of Norfolk in 1770 for his land agent, Vincent Eyre. The brick building, with slated roof, looked across Alsop Fields, amid sycamore trees, to the margin of the River Sheaf. About this time, the Duke commissioned designs from James Paine, and also from Thomas Atkinson, for laying out the fields with handsome squares and terraces. A start was made on building just before his death in 1777, but the scheme was abandoned, and we can speculate that Leader House was part of this grand plan.

In 1777, it was leased to Thomas Leader, a silversmith, from Broxted, Essex, who came to Sheffield to set up the firm of Tudor, Leader & Co in 1762 with Henry Tudor, who lived at nearby Tudor House.

The eminent Leader family remained until 1817, when it passed to the Pearson family until 1872. It was bought by Charles Wardlow, owner of Wardlow Steels Company on Carlisle Street, whose son, Marmaduke, later lived here spending large amounts of money renovating and improving the building.

It was sold by the Wardlows in 1920 and had several occupants including the silversmith company, Thomas Bradbury, and Son, which had workshops in Arundel Street, and the accountants Joshua Wortley & Sons.

The lease was bought by Sheffield Corporation in 1938 with plans of demolition, but the advent of the Second World war meant it was used as a headquarters for the ARP. It has remained with the council ever since, except for a period when it was leased to Sheffield Polytechnic, and today is used as administrative offices for Sheffield Museums.

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