Which Swindon celebrity is selling flowers? The great British art quiz

Girl Selling Flowers, 1946 © Desmond Morris. Photograph: Swindon Museum and Art Gallery

This quiz is brought to you in collaboration with Art UK, the online home for Britain’s public art collections, showing art from more than 3,000 venues and by 45,000 artists. Each day, a different collection on Art UK will set the questions. 

Today, our questions are set by Swindon Museum and Art Gallery, which has one of the most significant collections of modern British art in the UK. It includes predominantly paintings and works on paper, around 300 studio ceramics and a number of sculptural works. The collection features artists including Frank Auerbach, Lucien Freud and Henry Moore, as well as artists of local significance.

You can see art from Swindon Museum and Art Gallery on Art UK here. Find out more on the Swindon Museum and Art Gallery website here.

1. 

   Swindon Museum and Art Gallery is housed in Apsley House, which was built in the 1830s. But in which decade was it adapted to house Swindon’s collections?

   1. 1880s

   2. 1910s

   3. 1930s

   4. 1960s

2. 

   This scene was painted by Christopher Wood in 1930. But what popular seaside town does it depict?

   1. Bournemouth

   2. Lyme Regis

   3. St Ives

   4. Margate

3. 

   Christopher Wood and Ben Nicholson met Alfred Wallis in 1928, and were amazed by the simplicity and directness of his approach. This is demonstrated in Ship Amid Tall Waves. What was Wallis’ main profession?

   1. Builder

   2. Fisherman

   3. Plumber

   4. Bar tender

4. 

   Which Swindon-born celebrity did Desmond Morris depict in Girl Selling Flowers?

   1. Billie Piper

   2. Diana Dors

   3. Rachel Shelley

   4. Katherine Thomas

5. 

   Walter Sickert produced this study for his painting Vernets in 1920. What was ‘Vernets’?

   1. A bar

   2. A nightclub

   3. A cinema

   4. A fast food restaurant

6. 

   Swindon Museum and Art Gallery recently acquired two pieces from Swindon-based artist David Bent’s Aerobots series. Which of these subject matters is David well-known for being inspired by?

   1. Boats

   2. People

   3. Animals

   4. Planes

7. 

   This bronze bust of Virginia Woolf was created by Stephen Tomlin (1901-37). Which other famous member of the Bloomsbury group was Woolf’s sibling?

   1. Vanessa Bell

   2. Duncan Grant

   3. Roger Fry

   4. Leonard Woolf

8. 

   Which of these groups is Robert Bevan most closely affiliated with?

   1. The Camden Town Group

   2. The Bloomsbury Group

   3. The Kitchen Sink School

   4. Unit One

Solutions

1:C - Charles Gore founded the museum in 1919 but until the 1930s the collection, which was comprised largely of geological specimens, was housed at Victoria Hall in the town centre. The extension for the art gallery was added in the 1960s, and the whole building is now Grade II listed., 2:C - Christopher Wood is one of many artists inspired by St Ives in Cornwall. There, he was particularly close to Ben Nicholson, with whom he “discovered” Alfred Wallis.

 Image: Still Life With Boats, St Ives, Cornwall, 1930, Christopher Wood (1901-30), Swindon Museum and Art Gallery , 3:B - Wallis was an untrained artist and much of his work reflected what he knew – boats. He painted and drew boats on anything he could find, and Ship Amid Tall Waves utilises a piece of cardboard supplied by the local grocer. Image: 

Ship Amid Tall Waves, 19th-20th century, Alfred Wallis (1855-1942), Swindon Museum and Art Gallery, 4:B - Desmond Morris painted this vibrant image of Diana Dors when they were both still living in Swindon as teenagers. Morris, who was dating Dors at the time, captured her signature red lips and blonde hair. 

Image: Girl Selling Flowers, 1946, Desmond Morris (b 1928) , 5:A - The drawing was produced when Sickert was living in Dieppe (1919-22) and painting scenes of nightlife, including “cafes-concerts” at Vernet’s bar. 

Image: Study for ‘Vernet’s, Dieppe, 1920, Walter Richard Sickert (1860-1942), Swindon Museum and Art Gallery, 6:D - David Bent has been awarded honorary companionship of the Royal Aeronautical Society for his contribution to the aerospace profession. The Aerobots are constructed from close up photographs of planes, collaged together to create human-like robots. Image: 

Aerobots, 2003-05, David Bent © the artist. Swindon Museum and Art Gallery, 7:A - Virginia and Vanessa Stephen moved to Bloomsbury with their brothers Thoby and Adrian in 1904, where they began to form the Bloomsbury Group. Vanessa married art critic Clive Bell in 1907, and Virginia married political theorist Leonard Woolf in 1912. 

Image: Virginia Woolf (1882-1941), 1931 and posthumous cast in 1973, Stephen Tomlin/Morris Singer Art Foundry, Swindon Museum and Art Gallery , 8:A - Robert Bevan helped found the Camden Town Group in 1911. Its members also included Spencer Frederick Gore, Duncan Grant and Walter Sickert. 

Image: Back of the Granary, Poland, c1904, Robert Polhill Bevan (1865-1925), Swindon Museum and Art Gallery

Scores

1. 4 and above.

   Could have Swindon better!

2. 8 and above.

   You're a Swinner!

3. 0 and above.

   You need to swot up on Swindon!