We all have a fantasy art collection, and it’s often one of two things that stand in the way of realising that fantasy: money, and wall space. There may be a solution to the latter: contemporary art on a doll’s house scale.
Why hasn’t anyone thought of this before? Well, they have. In 1934, notable art dealer Sydney Burney saw Queen Mary’s Dolls’ House at Windsor Castle and a light bulb went off. All for a charitable cause, he asked some of his high-profile contemporaries, including Henry Moore, Ivon Hitchens and Vanessa Bell to create miniature artworks to fill a model art gallery, named The Thirty Four Gallery, designed by the architect Marshall Sissons.
Lost for decades, most of the works were rediscovered in a suitcase by Burney’s grandson, and the model was recreated by Pallant House Gallery in 1997, based on photographs. To mark the millennium, the Model Art Gallery 2000 opened its tiny doors, housing work by the likes of Frank Auerbach, Peter Blake, Anthony Caro, Prunella Clough, Antony Gormley, Richard Hamilton and Howard Hodgkin.
Now, another gallery appears to have taken a wrong turn down the rabbit hole. The 2021 Model Art Gallery at Pallant House in Chichester is presenting a microcosm of contemporary British art featuring new works created over the last year by 34 leading artists. There are sculptures by Julian Opie, ceramics by Grayson Perry, and the gallery’s façade features Lothar Götz's electric geometric mural, alongside works by Michael Armitage, Cecily Brown, Michael Craig-Martin, Gary Hume, Magdalene Odundo, and Rachel Whiteread.
Ever thought you’d have to squint for a closer look at a Sean Scully or see a porcelain pot by Edmund de Waal no bigger than a thimble? Elsewhere, there’s an expressive nude by Maggi Hambling that’s around the same dimensions as an iPhone, and a pocket-sized Damien Hirst spin painting. Most surprising of all is that, despite their shrunken state, the works in the Model Art Gallery have no less impact than their larger counterparts.
‘At the height of the first lockdown, artists could not get to their studios, exhibitions were cancelled, and many people spoke of being creatively blocked,’ says Pallant House Gallery director Simon Martin. ‘Inspired by the earlier model galleries, I wrote to some of Britain’s leading contemporary artists to ask whether they might participate in a project to create something positive out of the pandemic. Most of the artists usually work on a large scale and were excited by the challenge of condensing their ideas into a miniature artwork and by being part of such a unique history of modern and contemporary British art.’
INFORMATION
’Masterpieces in Miniature: The 2021 Model Art Gallery’, until Spring 2022, Pallant House Gallery. pallant.org.uk
ADDRESS
9 N Pallant
Chichester PO19 1TJ
-
Messika’s fluid jewellery is given a textural twistThe Parisian brand borrows a textural finish previously reserved for high jewellery with its new collection, ‘Move Ciselé’
-
This ingenious London office expansion was built in an on-site workshopNew Wave London and Thomas-McBrien Architects make a splash with this glulam extension built in the very studio it sought to transform. Here's how they did it
-
The bespoke Jaguar E-Type GTO melds elements from every era of the classic sports carECD Automotive Design’s one-off commission caters to a client who wanted to combine the greatest hits of Jaguar’s E-Type along with modern conveniences and more power
-
Lubaina Himid and Magda Stawarska’s new show at Kettle’s Yard will uncover the missing narratives in everyday life storiesThe artists and partners in life are collaborating on an immersive takeover of Kettle’s Yard, Cambridge, in an exhibition that delves into a lost literary legacy
-
See the fruits of Niki de Saint Phalle and Jean Tinguely's creative and romantic union at Hauser & Wirth SomersetAn intimate exhibition at Hauser & Wirth Somerset explores three decades of a creative partnership
-
Caroline Walker's new show speaks to women everywhere, including me'Everything related to my life with young children, because it's such an all encompassing experience,' the artist says of her new show at the Hepworth Wakefield
-
Cassi Namoda is rethinking stained-glass windows at Turner Contemporary in MargateThe artist drew from an eclectic range of references when considering the traditional medium for a Turner Contemporary window overlooking the beach – she tells us more
-
Meet the Turner Prize 2025 shortlisted artistsNnena Kalu, Rene Matić, Mohammed Sami and Zadie Xa are in the running for the Turner Prize 2025 – here they are with their work
-
The art of the textile label: how British mill-made cloth sold itself to Indian buyersAn exhibition of Indo-British textile labels at the Museum of Art & Photography (MAP) in Bengaluru is a journey through colonial desire and the design of mass persuasion
-
From counter-culture to Northern Soul, these photos chart an intimate history of working-class Britain‘After the End of History: British Working Class Photography 1989 – 2024’ is at Edinburgh gallery Stills
-
Surrealism as feminist resistance: artists against fascism in Leeds‘The Traumatic Surreal’ at the Henry Moore Institute, unpacks the generational trauma left by Nazism for postwar women
