THE PITMEN PAINTERS - This is London
National Theatre
I almost missed this exceptional coproduction between Newcastle's Live Theatre and the National, but I'm so glad I didn't. Right from the start Lee Hall's affectionate, clear-sighted account of the Ashington Group, which found fame in the art world in the 1930's, mixes blunt northern humour with stark naturalism in an honest portrayal of the class divide.
Based on William Feaver's book of the same name, Max Roberts' exemplary production follows a handful of miners (there were, in fact, several times this number) from their first art appreciation class, held in a hut in 1934 (the Workers Education Association apparently couldn't find anyone to teach introductory economics, their preferred topic) through to the Nationalisation of the coal industry in 1947. Quickly realising that, initially at least, these serious men in their serious suits – but with no frame of artistic reference – would learn little by just looking at slides, their teacher Robert Lyon (a Durham academic) soon had them producing their own works. Though they had no formal training, they proved themselves to be unexpectedly talented, graduating from powerful linocuts to equally truthful paintings - of their lives underground, their homes, the colliery, pit ponies and Bedlington terriers.
Hall (who wrote ‘Billy Elliot’) proves once again how adept he is at mixing genuine emotion with wit and social commentary, and questions what art means to the painter, the purchaser and the person who just looks and tries to understand. In what transpires to be one of the most rewarding evenings currently to be had in the theatre, he is perfectly served by an excellent, down-to-earth cast including Deka Walmsley's George (a stickler for rules and regulations), Michael Hodgson's Somme survivor (a Marxist who sees politics in every stroke), Christopher Connel's brooding Oliver Kilbourn (tempted by the offer of patronage and intensely moved by his growing appreciation of a previously inaccessible form of expression) and Ian Kelly's Lyon, whose own reputation was significantly boosted by his encouragement of these remarkable working class artists.
Louise Kingsley
National Theatre
I almost missed this exceptional coproduction between Newcastle's Live Theatre and the National, but I'm so glad I didn't. Right from the start Lee Hall's affectionate, clear-sighted account of the Ashington Group, which found fame in the art world in the 1930's, mixes blunt northern humour with stark naturalism in an honest portrayal of the class divide.
Based on William Feaver's book of the same name, Max Roberts' exemplary production follows a handful of miners (there were, in fact, several times this number) from their first art appreciation class, held in a hut in 1934 (the Workers Education Association apparently couldn't find anyone to teach introductory economics, their preferred topic) through to the Nationalisation of the coal industry in 1947. Quickly realising that, initially at least, these serious men in their serious suits – but with no frame of artistic reference – would learn little by just looking at slides, their teacher Robert Lyon (a Durham academic) soon had them producing their own works. Though they had no formal training, they proved themselves to be unexpectedly talented, graduating from powerful linocuts to equally truthful paintings - of their lives underground, their homes, the colliery, pit ponies and Bedlington terriers.
Hall (who wrote ‘Billy Elliot’) proves once again how adept he is at mixing genuine emotion with wit and social commentary, and questions what art means to the painter, the purchaser and the person who just looks and tries to understand. In what transpires to be one of the most rewarding evenings currently to be had in the theatre, he is perfectly served by an excellent, down-to-earth cast including Deka Walmsley's George (a stickler for rules and regulations), Michael Hodgson's Somme survivor (a Marxist who sees politics in every stroke), Christopher Connel's brooding Oliver Kilbourn (tempted by the offer of patronage and intensely moved by his growing appreciation of a previously inaccessible form of expression) and Ian Kelly's Lyon, whose own reputation was significantly boosted by his encouragement of these remarkable working class artists.
Louise Kingsley
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