From sculpture, to landscape, Dylan Thomas and the UK’s biggest art prize, National Museum Cardiff in Wales has a feast of art exhibitions for everyone in 2014 and admission is free! 2014 sees the celebrations surrounding the Dylan Thomas Centenary year. At National Museum Cardiff Sir Peter Blake presents his illustrations of Under Milk Wood (1953). This major body of work is the culmination of a 25-year project and is exhibited for the very first time. The show includes portraits of each of the characters in the cast, watercolours of the dream sequences and collages and paintings of scenes and locations in the fictional village of Llareggub.(now until 16 March 2014).
Ivor Roberts-Jones was one of this country’s finest portrait sculptors and produced some impressive monumental public sculptures in bronze. The Double Edge: Ivor Roberts-Jones exhibition focuses on his remarkable portraits in bronze of Welshmen who achieved greatness in all walks of life (7 December 2013 – 11 May 2014).
A new exhibition Wales: A Visitation. Poetry, Romanticism and Myth in Art takes inspiration from American writer, Allen Ginsberg’s poem Wales Visitation using works from the Museum’s collection to explore modern and contemporary forms of Romanticism. Ginsberg visited Wales in 1967 and after taking LSD explored the Welsh countryside. His experience inspired his poem Wales Visitation which drew on an imagined Celtic past and the landscape and folklore of Wales. Featured artists include David Jones, Richard Long, Graham Sutherland and Clare Woods. Supported by the Colwinston Charitable Trust. (22 February-7 September 2014).
Colwinston Charitable Trust also supports a new installation by Andrea Büttner combining two diverse collections held at National Museum Cardiff – the drawings of Gwen John from the art collections and moss from the herbarium. (22 February-7 September 2014).
One of Constable’s most famous paintings Salisbury Cathedral from the Meadows will be on loan to the museum from the Tate Gallery for six months. The display and a series of related events are supported by the Heritage Lottery Fund and the Art Fund. (7 March – 7 September 2014)
During his brief and tragic life, the Welsh artist James Dickson Innes (1887-1914) painted a unique vision of the Welsh landscape in an intensely colourful Post-Impressionist style. Marking the centenary of the artist’s death, the exhibition Landscapes by JD Innes: Beauty Most Wild will shed new light on the work of this unjustly neglected artist. (12 April – 20 July 2014)
A major exhibition Richard Wilson: The Transformation of European Art marks the 300th anniversary of the birth of Richard Wilson (1714-1782), perhaps Wales’s greatest artist. Before Wilson, British artists painted the landscape to record its appearance. Wilson showed how landscape paintings could have layers of meaning and convey mood and emotions too. A partnership with the Yale Center for British Art. (5 July – 26 October 2014)
Efforts and Ideals: Prints of the First World War is a display of all 66 lithographs from the 1917 print portfolio The Great War: Britain’s Efforts and Ideals, commissioned by the Ministry of Information. They provide a fascinating representation of Britain’s war objectives, military activities and effort on the Home Front, and include some of the best-known British artists of the period such as Augustus John, Frank Brangwyn, William Rothenstein and C.R.W Nevinson. (Sat 2 August-January 2015)
The Artes Mundi 6 Exhibition will be presented for 17 weeks at the National Museum of Art, Chapter and other locations around Cardiff from 25 October 2014. The Artes Mundi 6 Prize will be awarded on the 22nd January 2015. Ten artists from eight countries have been shortlisted coming from the UK, USA, Portugal, Israel, Croatia, Iceland, Brazil and the Netherlands. The winner will be announced in 2015 and receive £40,000.