Glyn Philpot: Flesh & Spirit, Pallant House Gallery, 2022
Glyn Philpot and his frequent muse, Henry Thomas
As poet in residence for this exhibition, I composed ekphrastic poems responding to several paintings by the artist, Glyn Philpot. I also devised and ran workshops in the composition of ekphrastic poetry for adults, school children and different groups in the local community.
This was the first major exhibition in almost 40 years of Philpot’s work. It mapped Philpot’s progression from Edwardian high society portraitist to his radically modernist style in the 1930s.
The exhibition was also notable for highlighting the artist’s uncommon and sensitive representation of black sitters from the 1910s to 1930s, as well as his exploration of both queer and religious subjects.
It added something special to my understanding of Philpot and his work when his great-great-niece, Charlotte Doherty (standing at the head of the table with a long green scarf in the last picture) dropped in to one of my workshops at the gallery.
I was interviewed by Kate Bryan for Sky Arts during my residency.
“Blackness never took up so much nameless space
as in his gaze the din of the world dims far away and small.”
- from Three Colours Black, after Head of a Black Man by Glyn Philpot, 1913 - 1914
“If you brave the scarp of my cheekbones you’ll read it in my eyes: A constellation of galaxies glittering my name.”
- from Call Me Balthazar, after Balthazar by Glyn Philpot, 1929
“The red thread of my dreams insists on itself,
sleep-stripes its path on my canvas.”
- from The Red Thread, after L’Apres Midi Tunisien by Glyn Philpot, 1922
“Confined to the limits of the human tower of our own corporeality
we will carry on to the end of fear and failure with the utmost gravity.”
- from Broken Ghazal for Pink Sheen and Gravity, after The Resting Acrobats by Glyn
Philpot, 1935
