The Beaney Museum, Canterbury

I had a few days away with Shirley, my sister-in-law, while her Mum is in respite.  We went to the Beaney Museum which was an excellent, small, local museum.  They were hot on representing the local community.

They had the Garden Room dedicated to paintings by local artist Thomas Sidney Cooper.  He painted lots of domestic animals, from all sorts of angles, varied in size - 16" x 12" up to 12' x 16'.  A popular rise was c 4' x 3' - suitable for the domestic Victorian parlour.  They also had a room where portraits depicted the kentish community - from old Van Dykes of affluent local landowners, to Dame Laura Knight's portrait of Hop Picking Granny, a gypsy.

The local school children community had an obvious presence.  They had done decorations for the Christmas tree and stairwell.  Also they had been involved in a workshop about the homeless. Excellent outreach work had been done with the homeless community (of which there are many in Canterbury) getting them to depict their situation, painting on cardboard boxes and waste paper.  Great  use of ground materials continued in a children's workshop where the pupils had drawn on paper bags to illustrate what they would take with them if all their belongings had to fit into a paper bag.  Very thought provoking.