On 15 March we launch our new LGBTQ+ tours at National Museum Cardiff. The tours have been developed in partnership with Pride Cymru working with self-confessed Museum queerator Dan Vo and an amazing team of volunteers.

You may already have read Norena Shopland's blog about the Ladies of Llangollen, and Young Heritage Leader Jake’s post, Queer Snakes! There are so many more LGBTQ+ stories in our collection – stories that have been hidden in dusty museum closets for too long. Friends, it’s time for us to let them out!

To whet your appetite, here’s a quick glimpse at one of the works you might spot on the tour…

The Mower, by Sir William Hamo Thornycoft

The Mower is a bronze statuette on display in our Victorian Art gallery. It is about half a metre high and shows a topless young farmworker in a hat and navvy boots resting with his arm on his hip, holding a scythe. This sassy pose, known as contrapposto, was inspired by Donatello’s David - a work with its own queer story to tell.

The Mower was made by William Hamo Thornycroft, one of the most famous sculptors in Britain in the nineteenth century, and was given to the Museum in 1928 by Sir William Goscombe John. An earlier, life-size version is at the Walker Art Gallery, Liverpool and is said to be the first significant free-standing sculpture showing a manual labourer made in Britain.

Thornycroft became fascinated with manual labourers and the working classes after being introduced to socialist ideas by his wife, Agatha Cox. He wrote ‘Every workman’s face I meet in the street interests me, and I feel sympathy with the hard-handed toilers & not with the lazy do nothing selfish ‘upper-ten.’ In The Mower, he presents the body of a young working-class man as though it's a classical hero or god – a brave move for the time.

Queering the Mower

With the rising interest in queer theory, many art historians have drawn attention to the queer in this sculpture. In an article by Michael Hatt the work is described as homoerotic, which he describes as that ambiguous space between the homosocial and homosexual.

One of the main factors is the artist’s relationship with Edmund Gosse, a writer and critic who helped establish Thornycroft’s reputation in the art world. Gosse was married with children, but his letters to Thornycroft give us a touching insight into their relationship.

He describes times they spent together basking in the sun in meadows and swimming naked in rivers; and they are filled with love poems and giddy declarations of affection. ‘Nature, the clouds, the grass, everything takes on new freshness and brightness now I have you to share the world with,’ he wrote. Gosse was so obsessed with Thornycroft that writer Lytton Strachey famously joked he wasn’t homosexual, but Hamo-sexual.

Gosse and Thornycroft were spending time together when the first inspiration for The Mower hit. They were sailing with a group of friends up the Thames when they spotted a real-life mower on the riverbank, resting. Thornycroft made a quick sketch, and the idea for the sculpture was born. A wax model sketch from 1882 is at the Tate.

The real-life mower they saw was wearing a shirt, but for his sculpture Thornycroft stripped him down. He explained to his wife that he wanted to ‘keep his hat on and carry his shirt’ and that a brace over his shoulder will help ‘take off the nude look’.

Brace or no brace, it’s difficult to hide the fact that this is a celebration of the male body designed for erotic appeal. Thornycroft used an Italian model, Orazio Cervi. Cervi was famous in Victorian Britain for his ‘perfectly proportioned physique’ (art historical speak for a hot bod!)

Later in the century, photographs of The Mower and other artworks were collected and exchanged in secret along with photographs of real life nudes, by a network of men mostly in London – a kind of queer subculture, although it wouldn’t have been understood in those terms back then.

This was dangerous ground. The second half of the nineteenth century saw what has been described as a ‘homosexual panic’, with rising anxieties around gender identity, sexuality and same-sex desire. Fanny and Stella, the artist Simeon Solomon and Oscar Wilde were among many who were hounded and publicly prosecuted for ‘indecent’ behaviour.

These tensions showed up in the art world too. Many of the artists associated with the Aesthetic and Decadent movements in particular were under scrutiny for producing works that were described as ‘effeminate’, ‘degenerate’ or ‘decadent’. But works like The Mower suggest that art might have provided a safer space for playing out private desires in a public arena at this time.

Book your place on our free volunteer-led LGBTQ+ tours here, and keep an eye on our website and social media for future dates!  

Ocean Quahogs, called Arctica islandica by scientists, grow up to 13cm long and can reach great ages. One shell was aged at 507 years old and so was nicknamed Ming because it would have been born in 1499 during the Ming Dynasty in China.

But how do we know how old Ming is?

Trees, corals and clams grow by adding layers that create annual lines. Counting these lines allows them to be aged. This process of counting them is called Sclerochonology pronounced ‘sklero-kronologee’. Tree rings can be found by simply cutting through a tree trunk and the lines, visible as rings because tree trunks are roughly circular in cross-section, are clearly visible. In our Natural History gallery we have a large tree section with important events in history labelled on the rings – come and see it!

Ocean Quahogs lay down layers of calcium carbonate every year and these layers form lines that can be counted. The thin sections of shell need to be embedded in resin so they can be handled without breaking and the lines within can then be counted. As with corals, calcium carbonate is taken from the surrounding ocean to create layers of calcium carbonate and so Information on sea temperature, light and nutrient conditions is trapped in the layers. These characteristics can then be analysed decades or even centuries later to provide information on climate change. Scientists have already analysed over 1,300 years of past climate information from the North Atlantic.

To find out where Ocean Quahogs live and how long some animals can live for go to:

https://museum.wales/blog/2020-02-12/Meet-Ming-the-clam---the-oldest-animal-in-the-world-/

Mae gwlân yn cael ei ddathlu fel ffibr hollol naturiol, cynaladwy a bioddiraddadwy'r dyfodol. Mewn oes lle mae'n rhaid i ni gwestiynu'r effaith y mae ffasiwn gyflym yn ei gael ar y blaned, mae nifer cynyddol ohonom yn dychwelyd i ffibrau naturiol – nid dim ond ar gyfer dillad, ond hefyd i inswleiddio a dodrefnu eu cartref. Mae gwarchod sgiliau traddodiadol yn rhan bwysig o waith Amgueddfa Cymru, ond gyda'r diddordeb cynyddol hwn mewn ffibrau naturiol a chynaliadwy, yn ogystal â'r ymchwydd mewn ffasiwn a thecstilau cartref, mae’r sgiliau yma a gysidrwyd am flynyddoedd yn 'grefftau treftadaeth ' nawr yn datblygu'n sgiliau pwysig ar gyfer ein dyfodol.

Mae ymwelwyr â'r Amgueddfa Wlân Genedlaethol yn Dre-fach Felindre eisoes yn mwynhau gwylio meistr wehyddwyr Melin Teifi, Melin wlân fasnachol sy'n denantiaid yn yr Amgueddfa, yn gwehyddu ffabrigau hardd mewn patrymau traddodiadol ar wyddau mecanyddol. Maen nhw'n darparu cipolwg diddorol i’n hymwelwyr ar waith a phrosesau melin weithiol. Ond yn anffodus, Melin Teifi yw'r felin wlân olaf yng Nghymru sy'n cynhyrchu gwlanen draddodiadol Gymreig. Yn anterth y diwydiant yn yr ugeinfed ganrif roedd 217 o felinau gwlân yng Nghymru, yn bennaf yn cynhyrchu carthenni Cymreig, gwlanen a brethyn tapestri. Ar hyn o bryd mae 7 i 8 o felinau gwlân yn gweithredu yng Nghymru, ac mae perygl difrifol na fydd y sgiliau hyn yn cael eu cynnal ar gyfer y dyfodol, oni wneir ymdrech gydunol. Dyna pam y mae Amgueddfa Cymru yn arbennig o falch i groesawu tri chrefftwr newydd dan hyfforddiant i'n tîm yn yr Amgueddfa Wlân Genedlaethol. Ymunodd James Whittall, Jay Jones a Richard Collins a ni ym mis Rhagfyr ac maent eisoes wedi dechrau ar eu hyfforddiant mewn sgiliau crefftau treftadaeth. Yn ddiweddar, maen nhw wedi dechrau arddangos rhai o'u sgiliau crefft llaw newydd, i'n hymwelwyr. Mae hyn yn ein helpu i ddod â stori'r diwydiant gwlân a chasgliad yr Amgueddfa yn fyw. Wrth iddyn nhw ddatblygu sgiliau gwehyddu dros y misoedd a'r blynyddoedd nesaf, y gobaith yw y byddant hefyd yn ein helpu i gyflawni rhywfaint o'r galw cynyddol am gynnyrch wedi ei wreiddio mewn traddodiad, a datblygu gweithgaredd masnachol newydd ar gyfer yr Amgueddfa.

Gallai gweithgaredd o'r fath gefnogi ein heconomi wledig ac ysgogi cyfleoedd i'n pobl ifanc wireddu'r potensial o ennill gwaith a bywydau boddhaus yn yr ardal, gyda'r fantais ychwanegol o gefnogi cynhaliaeth a datblygiad y Gymraeg. Mae tirwedd y diwydiant gwlân yng Nghymru yn debygol o newid dros y blynyddoedd nesaf, ac mae potensial i dwf 'melinau meicro', yn ddibynnol ar sgiliau traddodiadol yn cael eu cadw i alluogi cyflenwi i ddylunwyr Cymreig. Rydym yn falch iawn o fod yn chwarae ein rhan i adfer y sgiliau gwerthfawr hyn i gefnogi adfywio'r hyn sydd yn hanesyddol wedi bod yn un o ddiwydiannau pwysicaf Cymru.

Richard Collins, Crefftwr o dan Hyfforddiant, yn dysgu nyddu ar y droell nyddu.

BBC Radio Wales Rhaglen Roy Noble 01/03/2020: Crefftwyr newydd Amgueddfa Wlân Cymru

(Gwrandewch o 1:12:00)