Adolphe Valette: the Manchester Impressionist

Wednesday 4 May 2022 at 2.00 pm at the Lowther Pavilion. Members can also watch via Zoom. Guests may attend the lecture – £8 pp (pay on door)

The lecture notes leaflet can be downloaded/printed here

Julia Marwood

Julia has loved looking at art since discovering the work of Gustav Klimt while teaching English in Austria as part of her German degree course at the University of Durham. She spent the first part of her career teaching German, then did a Master’s in Teaching English at the University of Manchester, and went on to teach international students in the city. She became a tour guide at Manchester Art Gallery and knew at once that this was what she really wanted to do, spending every spare moment learning about art history. She eventually left language teaching in 2018 and since then has loved spending all her time sharing her passion for art as a speaker to many different groups. She became an Accredited Lecturer of The Arts Society in 2020, specialising in Scottish art from 1880 and the art of Manchester.

 

Lowry said of his tutor at the Manchester Municipal School of Art, “I can’t overestimate the effect on me at that time of the coming into this drab city of Adolph Valette, full of the French Impressionists, aware of everything that was going on in Paris. He had a freshness and a breadth of experience that exhilarated his students.” With more than a touch of French elegance, Valette depicted modern life in wet and dirty Cottonopolis, creating a sense of timeless beauty. He left behind an impressive body of work when he returned to the region of his birth, and continued there to produce light-filled, radiant works. This lecture will explore the life and work of an artist whose fine work and inspirational teaching are finally receiving the recognition they deserve.

 

Caption: Albert Square, Manchester 1910  by Pierre Adolphe Valette; Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons