A range of incredible Victorian treasures will be shown at Leighton House this summer combining two very different collections.
Collecting some 70 years apart, Cecil French (1879-1953) and Scott Thomas Buckle both began acquiring Victorian art against the grain of fashionable taste. Both collections reflect their personal perspectives and interests, and include never-before seen rare drawings and highly accomplished oil paintings by Alma-Tadema, Burne-Jones, Watts and Leighton himself, amongst others.
Victorian Treasures from the Cecil French Bequest showcases a curated selection of 21 paintings by Victorian masters from the extraordinary collection of artist and collector Cecil French which was bequeathed to the public after his death. At the centre of the exhibition are seven paintings by Edward Burne-Jones (1833-1898), including The Wheel of Fortune (1875), one of Burne-Jones’s best-known compositions. Also exhibited is Apricots (1866) by Albert Moore (1841-1893), one of the artist’s earliest paintings in the Aesthetic style. Moore exhibited Apricots alongside another aesthetic painting, Pomegranates, at the Royal Academy in 1866. Cecil French later acquired both paintings, reuniting them in his collection.
French’s oil painting collection will be alongside a collection of works on paper from the same period but acquired much later. Art historian Scott Thomas Buckle began collecting artworks in the 1980s, with a particular interest in 19th century British drawings and the models that featured in prominent works by Pre-Raphaelites and artist of the Aesthetic movement. The collection encompasses a variety of techniques and styles employed by the Victorians and explores how their drawing practice relates to their wider body of work, establishing a dialogue with paintings in the museum’s own collection and in the Cecil French display.
Listings
Victorian Treasures from the Cecil French Bequest
24 May to 21 September 2025
Verey Exhibition Gallery | Included within admission ticket
Victorian Treasures from the Scott Thomas Buckle Collection
24 May to 21 September 2025
Tavolozza Drawings Gallery | Free entry
Gallery Opening Times: Wednesdays to Mondays, 10am to 5:30pm
General Admission Tickets to Leighton House available HERE