Two new exhibitions have been confirmed for The Queen’s Gallery, Buckingham Palace later this year, bringing an old world view to the Royal Collection Trust residence. The first of the two is called Gold and it’s a beautiful whistle stop tour of stunning artifacts that have been created out of the precious metal since the Bronze Age, while the second, entitled Cairo To Constantinople: Early Photography Of The Middle East, takes in some of the earliest images of Egypt, Palestine, Syria, Lebanon, Turkey and Greece.
Both of the exhibitions will be opening on the 7th November 2014, running throughout the height of the winter months until the 22nd February 2015. A joint ticket has been created by The Queen’s Gallery to cover entry to both of the exhibitions and the price is £9.50 for adult tickets, £8.75 for concessions and £4.80 for under 17 year olds. Entrance for any keen eyed precious metal or Middle East historian under 5 years old is free.
It’s not the first showing of the Cairo To Constantinople exhibition, however, as it had its debut at The Queens Gallery in the Palace of Hollyrood House in Edinburgh back in Spring 2013 (see details at https://www.tuppencemagazine.co.uk/cairo-constantinople-comes-queens-gallery-edinburgh/), but this will be the first opportunity to see the collection of early photography of the Muddle East in the London residence.
The images for the exhibition come from a tour that the Prince of Wales, who went on to become King Edward VII, was sent on for educational purposes of the Middle East in the mid 19th Century. With photographer, Francis Bedford, in the same party as the 21-year-old Prince, the entire journey was captured on film, including some of the earliest shots of Egypt, Palestine, Syria, Lebanon, Turkey and Greece. While the Prince’s trip saw him meeting dignitaries throughout the Middle East, it was actually a much more down to earth trek on horseback with the limited luxury of tents for accomodation.
The Gold exhibition, on the other hand, is all about the opulence and innate beauty of the rare metal that has been used throughout the years to create everything from status symbols to jewelry and works of art. Spanning a time period that stretches from the Bronze Age (c. 3300–600 BC) to the present day, it’s an ambitious collection of golden artifacts that reiterates the brilliant properties it has, which have made it the most iconic of metals.
Items that have been included in the exhibition include the Rillaton Cup, an incredibly rare biconical gold vessel created during the Bronze Age out of a single sheet of gold. It was made at a time when iron tools didn’t existed, so it’s existence is the all the more impressive, considering the efforts its creator would have had to gone through to work it. William Nicholson’s still life depiction of a shimmering gold jug, painted in the 1930s, will also be on display. it was a part of a series of work that explored the effects of light on metal surfaces.
