As director of the Tate Gallery, Alan Bowness always included a gallery devoted to the Pre-Raphaelites in the permanent display, and the enormously popular exhibition devoted to them in 1984 attracted more than 200,000 visitors. The catalogue presented the fruits of first-hand research (I wrote on Holman Hunt), and many more exhibitions and books followed in Britain and internationally.
Judith Bronkhurst
Alan Bowness viewed his involvement with the opening of the Heong Gallery at Downing C0llege, Cambridge, in 2016 as a “wonderful last act”. Meeting the architect – Adam Caruso – was an important step in obtaining his commitment to the project.
His personal collection of paintings, promised ultimately to the Fitzwilliam Museum, was shown at the first exhibition: Generation Painting 1955-1965.
He contributed to the catalogue, opened the gallery and continued to give me quarterly supervisions on how his old college could best engage with the art world. A long-term loan to Downing of Barbara Hepworth’s Divided Circle is a reminder of the generosity of Alan and his daughter, Sophie Bowness, the trustee of the Hepworth estate.
Susan Lintott
