Willow Trees, Wiltshire
Nancy Tennant is the maiden name of Nancy Dugdale, who in 1959 became 1st Baroness Crathorne. An active campaigner for the arts throughout her life, she was also a keen painter herself, as this portrait, gifted to the Middlesbrough collection by her family, evidences.
From 1952 Lady Crathorne was president of the Friends of Middlesbrough Art Gallery, galvanising this small group of highly active individuals towards their two aims: to establish a permanent art gallery for Middlesbrough and to build an art collection that would provide a legacy for future generations. In both of these aims she was hugely successful. By 1958 the authorities in Middlesbrough had acquired a Victorian villa at 320 Linthorpe Road, allowing the art gallery to move out of the leaking roofed former Methodist chapel that was located immediately behind where mima is today. The Friends mission then shifted to acquiring works for the gallery to house, raising funds and negotiating gifts of no fewer than 17 works between the opening of the new gallery and her retirement in 1966.
In 2011, the current Lord Crathorne, Nancy’s son, presented mima with an archive of documents relating to the Friends of Middlesbrough Art Gallery that had been maintained by his mother. This collection of letters, press clippings and notes for speeches, provides a fascinating glimpse into the drive and energy of this great personality and much of the history of art in Middlesbrough during the post-war period. Lady Crathorne was a capable orator, carrying listeners along with her vision to help culture thrive in this area. We see through these documents how she was able to persuade leading art experts to lend their support in selecting works for the collection and motivate industrialists from the area to recognise the value of art through funding acquisitions. Whilst recognising that to many people, Teesside was defined by its heavy industry, she did not accept that this should be at the exclusion of art, rather she was visionary in seeing how these two aspects of a town could be complimentary to one another.
Presented by the artists's family.