The architect William Henry Playfair was born in Russell Square, London, July 1789. On the death of his father, Playfair was sent to reside with his uncle in Edinburgh. Professor John Playfair, mathematician and geologist and a leading figure in the Edinburgh Enlightenment, took control of his nephew’s education. Following his father’s profession, the young Playfair studied under William Starke of Glasgow. His first public appointment was the laying out of part of the New Town in Edinburgh in 1815.

University of Edinburgh (Old College): Transverse section through southern range

Then, after a visit to France in 1816, he established himself professionally by winning the commission in 1817 to complete the unfinished University buildings (leaving the front as designed by Robert and James Adam). He also designed the city’s Royal Terrace and Regent Terrace on the Calton Hill estate; the unfinished National Monument on Calton Hill; and, the Royal Scottish Academy and the National Gallery on the Mound. While Playfair’s most important works in Edinburgh have been executed in the Greek revivalist or classical style – earning for Edinburgh the title of ‘Athens of the North’ – he was competent in other styles too. He designed New College for the ten newly established Free Church of Scotland, a jagged-lined rendering of the Gothic style. He also built country houses and mansions in the Italianate and Tudor styles.

Playfair died in Edinburgh after a long illness on 27 May 1857. His Trustees donated his drawings to the University the following year.

Containing over 5,000 drawings, and with largely only a typescript catalogue of the briefest of descriptions, the collection presents many challenges. Despite these it is one of our most frequently consulted collections. As part of our move to ArchivesSpace, we managed to get a the overarching structure of the catalogue keyed and online.

Late last year we hosted a very productive seminar on Playfair, where academics, curators and others discussed Playfair, the collection and issues around both. This month sees the start of a project where we have two architecture students on placement who are going to make a detailed study of a subset of the drawings, identifying key information within them. This will be both general information (e.g. date, scale, type of drawing etc.) and also detail more specific to Playfair and the buildings. This will allow us to both improve the existing catalogue almost immediately and also draft an overarching schema for cataloguing the collection as a whole. This will then allow us to more accurately estimate the resource that would be required.

Due to both the arrangement of the collection and familiarity (at least to some degree) with the building in question, the project will focus on drawings of Old College. We began with drawings covering the west range and south-west corner. These originally housed Chemistry, Practice of Physic and the Natural History Museum and, even at first glance, the drawings are yielding all sorts of information, such as Playfair’s work pattern – he was generally producing one drawing per day. He also produced a number of detailed drawings at 1:1 scale. There is also much evidence of his innovative use of structural iron work.

This project is a collaboration with Dr Richard Anderson (School of Architecture and Landscape Architecture), whose students, Federica and Xue, are contributing their expertise to a fascinating exploration of one of our most treasured collections.

RECENT ACQUISITION OF 19th CENTURY ILLUSTRATED JAPANESE CALLIGRAPHIC MANUSCRIPT

Recently arrived in to the holdings of the Centre for Research Collections (CRC) is this profusely illustrated manuscript devoted to the ceramic vessels used in the chanoyu or Japanese Tea Ceremony.

Labels to the 4-volume Japanese ms (Coll-1693)

The tea ceremony, also called the ‘way of tea’ is a Japanese cultural activity involving the ceremonial preparation and presentation of powdered green tea (matcha). Zen Buddhisim was a primary influence in the development of the ceremony and the art and manner in which it is performed.

Bird illustrated in the ms showing illustrations of ceramic vessels (Coll-1693)

Tea gatherings are classified as: an informal tea gathering or chakai, offering a relatively simple course of hospitality that includes confections, thin tea, and perhaps a light meal; and a formal tea event chaji, usually including a full-course meal followed by confections, thick tea, and thin tea. A chaji can last several hours.

Ceramic vessel illustrated in the Japanese ms (Coll-1693)

Some of the utensils used in the ceremony were: kogo – small ceramic or wooden containers used to hold pieces of incense, with their use varying with the seasons (wooden ones holding the chips of incense wood for summer ceremonies, ceramic ones holding kneaded incense in winter ceremonies); and, cha ire – tea container.

Ceramic vessel illustrated in the Japanese ms (Coll-1693)

The four volumes comprising the illustrated ms on paper – and dated at circa 1850-1865 – are entitled: Ko Bon Zu-e Ko, and Meibutsu Chajin Zu-e. These are volumes containing c. 188 watercolour illustrative diagrams of regional or speciality utensils – ceramic vessels or tea caddies – for students of the tea ceremony, chajin, and illustrations of incense trays and boxes.

Label on the rather worn silk-covered folding slipcase (coll-1693)

The volumes are gathered in a cover which holds the label: Japanese manuscript (4 illustrated Vols) on Pottery (Kogo and Cha-Ire) of the Cha-No-Yu or Tea Ceremony.

Ceramic vessel illustrated in the Japanese ms (Coll-1693)

The text and images of three volumes are on both sides of concertina-bound paper. The volumes are stitched in silk covered wrappers with ms labels to the upper covers.

Ceramic vessel illustrated in the Japanese ms (Coll-1693)

Dr. Graeme D. Eddie, Assistant Librarian Archives & Manuscripts, Centre for Research Collections

Note: this blog-post was constructed using the sales literature, information on the item, and a number of relevant websites.

FROM LETTERS IN THE HUGH MACDIARMID (C. M. GRIEVE) COLLECTIONS HERE AT EDINBURGH

During this 80th anniversary of his early death, a new film adaptation of Sunset Song by Lewis Grassic Gibbon is to be released on 4 December 2015. Lewis Grassic Gibbon was the pseudonym of James Leslie Mitchell who was born in Auchterless in February 1901.

Mitchell was raised in Arbuthnott, Kincardineshire, and in his teens he started work as a journalist with the Aberdeen Journal (which would later become the Press and Journal) and also for the Scottish Farmer.  In 1919 he joined the Royal Army Service Corps (RASC) and then in 1920 he joined the Royal Air Force (RAF). In 1925 he married and settled in Welwyn Garden City. He wrote a number of works under both his real name and his pseudonym before dying in his 30s of peritonitis brought on by a perforated ulcer – in February 1935.

Letter from Grieve to Stanley Nott (Grieve Coll-18)

His earliest writing is described in a  letter from Christopher M. Grieve (Hugh MacDiarmid) to Charles Stanley Nott (1887-1978) author, publisher and translator, in what reads almost like a letter of introduction. The letter is dated 19 October 1933, and was written from Whalsay, Shetland.

Letter from Grieve to Nott (Grieve, Coll-18)

Grieve writes to ‘My dear Stanley’:

I’ve suggested to a friend of mine that he should call in and make your acquaintance. He is a young Scottish Writer, J. Leslie Mitchell, who has published histories of Mexican antiquities etc but also novels and imaginative romances over his own name, the latest being an historical novel…

Letter from Grieve to Nott (Grieve, Coll-18)

When referring to ‘histories of Mexican antiquities’, Grieve may have been pointing towards The Conquest of the Maya (1934). The historical novel mentioned was Spartacus which had been ‘well reviewed’ in the Times Literary Supplement, and which had been written under his own name, J. Leslie Mitchell.

Letter from Grieve to Nott (Grieve, Coll-18)

Grieve goes on:

…over the name Lewis Grassic Gibbon he has lately scored a great success with ‘Sunset Song’ and ‘Cloud Howe’, the first two volumes of a trilogy of novels…

Letter from Grieve to Nott (Grieve, Coll-18)

At the time of this correspondence to Nott – October 1933 – Grieve tells us that Mitchell’s publishers ‘are Jarrold’s, and Faber and Faber for a biography of the explorer, Mungo Park’, and that Mitchell and he ‘are collaborating in a miscellany on Scotland’. The Mungo Park work in question was Niger: The Life of Mungo Park (1934), and  the collaborative work by Grieve and Mitchell was Scottish scene (also 1934).

Letter from Grieve to Nott (Grieve, Coll-18)

During these Whalsay years – island life in east Shetland – Grieve then writes:

Excuse haste. This is just being dashed off in time to catch the mail-boat […] Yours C.M.G.

Dr. Graeme D. Eddie, Assistant Librarian Archives and Manuscripts, Centre for Research Collections (Special Collections)

William Henry Playfair

On 2 Nov 2015, the CRC hosted a seminar which looked at the figure of William Henry Playfair (1790-1857), discussing his life and work and looking in some detail at a range of architectural drawings which had been selected from our collection.

John Playfair

Playfair was born was born in Russell Square, London, July 1789. On the death of his father, architect James Playfair, he was sent to reside with his uncle in Edinburgh. Professor John Playfair, mathematician and geologist and a leading figure in the Edinburgh Enlightenment, took control of his nephew’s education. Following his father’s profession, the young Playfair studied under William Starke of Glasgow. Following Starke’s death in 1813, Playfair moved to London where he worked in the offices of James Wyatt and Robert Smirke, returning to Edinburgh in 1816.

He established himself professionally by winning the commission in 1817 to complete the unfinished University buildings (leaving the front as designed by Robert and James Adam). He also designed the city’s Royal Terrace and Regent Terrace on the Calton

College of Edinburgh Transverse Section of the Southern Buildings

Hill estate; the unfinished National Monument on Calton Hill; and, the Royal Scottish Academy and the National Gallery on the Mound. While Playfair’s most important works in Edinburgh have been executed in the Greek revivalist or classical style – earning for Edinburgh the title of ‘Athens of the North’ – he was competent in other styles too. He designed New College for the ten newly established Free Church of Scotland, a jagged-lined rendering of the Gothic style. He also built country houses and mansions in the Italianate and Tudor styles.

The discussion in the seminar was not structured in any major way but flowed directly from looking at the drawings we had selected to view.  Alongside the physical drawings, we also looked at digitised ones, using the complement of both to do things which one or other could not do alone.

With over 5000 to choose from, electing the drawings was never going to be an easy task.  However we settled on one or more drawings relating to the following of Playfair’s projects:

• College of Edinburgh
• Royal Observatory
• Dollar Academy
• Blenheim Place
• Elm Row
• Royal Institution
• Royal Institution Additions
• National Monument
• Royal College of Surgeons
• Stewart Monument
• Donaldson’s Hospital
• New College Edinburgh

Links:

• All of the digitised drawings can be viewed in a dedicated online gallery
• View Playfair in the Archives Catalogue

140th ANNIVERSARY OF HIS BIRTH

THE EVE OF SAINT AGNES – RECENT ACQUISITION AT CENTRE FOR RESEARCH COLLECTIONS, EDINBURGH UNIVERSITY LIBRARY

Saturday 10 October 2015 marks the 140th anniversary of the birth of Charles Oppenheimer, craftsman and artist. Oppenheimer was born in Chorlton-upon-Medlock, Manchester, on 10 October 1875. He was a prize-winning student at Manchester School of Art, and his first picture was exhibited at the Manchester Academy of Fine Arts in 1894. His studies also took him to Italy.

After marriage in 1903, and after discovering – for him anyway – the acceptable light of Kirkcudbright he moved with his wife to Scotland in 1908 joining other artists in this community in south-western Scotland. By this time Oppenheimer had established himself, having exhibited his first picture at the Royal Academy, London, in 1906.

Other works over six decades include: The Lion of St. Mark, Venice, exhibited 1898, and illuminated manuscript of the poem by John Keats The Eve of St. Agnes (c. 1901), Kircudbright Harbour (c. 1910), Kirkcudbright (c. 1913), Verona (1914), Morning mist – Lake of Lugano (c. 1925), Siena at dusk (c. 1929),  San Francesco, Assisi (1930s), and Blossom, Buckland Burn (c. 1940).

Recently, Edinburgh University Library acquired the illuminated handwritten manuscript crafted by Charles Oppenheimer of the poem The Eve of Saint Agnes, by John Keats. The bound volume is of thirteen pages of vellum – ‘a prodigious piece of work’ – and demonstrates Oppenheimer’s craftsmanship, skill and drawing. It is not known whether the item was a commission, an academic exercise or business sample.

Saint Agnes, from ‘The Eve of Saint Agnes’, Charles Oppenheimer, 1901

Saint Agnes’ Eve – Ah, bitter chill it was! The owl, for all his feathers, was a-cold… stanza 1

The Eve of Saint Agnes was written by John Keats in 1819 and it was published in 1820, becoming one of his finest poems. Keats based his poem on the superstition that a girl could see her future husband in a dream if she performed certain rites on the eve of St. Agnes. In the 42-stanza poem we meet an old man of prayer (a beadsman), many an amarous cavalier, Madeline, old Angela, and Porphyro.

Carved angel, from ‘The Eve of Saint Agnes’, Charles Oppenheimer, 1901

The carved angels, ever eager-eyed, stared, where upon their heads the cornice rests… stanza 4

Young Porphyro, from ‘The Eve of Saint Agnes’, Charles Oppenheimer, 1901

Meantime, across the moors, had come young Porphyro, with heart on fire for Madeline… stanza 9

Full-blown rose, from ‘The Eve of Saint Agnes’, Charles Oppenheimer, 1901

Sudden a thought came like a full-blown rose, flushing his brow, and in his pained heart made purple riot… stanza 16

Legioned fairy, from ‘The Eve of Saint Agnes’, Charles Oppenheimer, 1901

While legioned fairies paced the coverlet, and pale enchantment held her sleepy-eyed… stanza 19

Out went the taper, from ‘The Eve of Saint Agnes’, Charles Oppenheimer, 1901

Out went the taper as she hurried in; its little smoke, in pallid moonshine died… stanza 23

Hollow lute, from ‘The Eve of Saint Agnes’, Charles Oppenheimer, 1901

Awakening up, he took her hollow lute – tumultuous – and, in chords that tenderest be, he played an ancient ditty… stanza 33

My Porphyro…ethereal, from ‘The Eve of Saint Agnes’, Charles Oppenheimer, 1901

At these voluptuous accents, he arose, ethereal, flushed, and like throbbing star… stanza 36

Down the dark stairs a darkling way they found, from ‘The Eve of Saint Agnes’, Charles Oppenheimer, 1901

They glide, like phantoms, into the wide hall; like phantoms, to the iron porch, they glide… stanza 41

Charles Oppenheimer exhibited at the Royal Academy in London, the Royal Scottish Academy, at the Royal Scottish Academy of Painters in Watercolours (RSW), at the Royal Glasgow Institute of Fine Arts, the Aberdeen Artists’ Society, and in Liverpool. He designed a number of posters for Britain’s railways, depicting local beauty spots, and he also designed the badge and motto ‘Sempere Vigilo’ of the Scottish Police Force (now Police Scotland).

Charles Oppenheimer died in Kirkcudbright on 16 April 1961.

Detail at stanza 42, from ‘The Eve of Saint Agnes’, Charles Oppenheimer, 1901

Dr. Graeme D. Eddie, Assistant Librarian Archives & Manuscripts, Centre for Research Collections, Edinburgh University Library

The following work was referred to in the creation of this blog-post:

Charles Oppenheimer. From craftsman to artist, by Euan Robson. Edinburgh: Atelier Books, 2012.