MINORIES
The Minories Galleries at 74 High Street, Colchester, Essex is Colchester's oldest Art Gallery. The building now known as the Minories was acquired in 1731 by Isaac Boggis with wealth from the woollen bays or baize making trade. The Tudor mansion was remodelled as an elegant Georgian residence for his son, Thomas Boggis, in 1776. It started to be called 'The Minories' in the 1870s, when it became fashionable to give buildings names. From 1884 to 1902 the house was leased by Dr Charles Otto Gustavus Becker, father of the artist Harry Becker who was raised in the Minories. In 1915 Geoffrey Crawford Bensusan-Butt, took the lease, and his wife, Dr Ruth Bensusan-Butt, a local doctor, who had her consulting rooms in the front of the building and in 1923 they purchased the property from the Boggis-Rolfe family. Ruth was sister-in-law to artist Lucien Camille Pissarro (1863-1944), father of Orovida Camille Pissarro, and the Pissarro family visited regularly. After her retirement, in 1956 Ruth Bensusan-Butt sold the Minories to the Victor Batte-Lay Trust, which later became the Foundation. Since then, the building has been run as a Gallery directly by the Victor Batte-Lay Foundation and has also hosted tenants including Firstsite and Colchester Institute. Over the years the Minories has exhibited a variety of works largely by East Anglian artists or practitioners with local connections. These include Roderic Barrett, Edward Bawden, Hermann Wilhelm (Bill) Brandt (1904-1983), Peter Coker, [Hugh Verschoyle Cronyn (1905-1996), Jacob Epstein (1880-1959), Maggi Hambling, [Cedric Morris,960]], brothers John Nash and Paul Nash (1889-1946), Lucien Camille Pissarro (1863-1944), Eric William Ravilious (1903-1942), Valerie Thornton, Leon George Claude Underwood (1890-1975), Mark Wallinger (1959-) and John Christopher Wood (1901-1930). The Victor Batte-Lay Foundation, assisted by the ‘Friends of The Minories’ support group, ensured the the building be used to present art for the community of Colchester and visitors to the city but by the early 1990s the Trust's resources diminished to the extent that the gallery was forced to close through lack of funding in 1992. In 1994 the Minories reopened using public money from Essex County Council, Colchester Borough Council and East of England Arts and went through a major refurbishment in 2007/8.
Works by This Artist
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