Future Exhibitions

Samuel Johnson defined “spectacle” in 1755 as “a show; a gazing stock; any thing exhibited to the view as eminently remarkable.”  This exhibition will explore the range of spectacular shows that were offered to the fee-paying public in Georgian London, from exhibitions of paintings, to scientific demonstrations, to the display of wondrous animals.  These shows were such an integral part of the visual culture that Horace Walpole complained in 1770, “The rage to see these exhibitions is so great, that sometimes one cannot pass through the streets where they are … it is incredible what sums are raised by mere exhibitions of anything … to enter at which you pay a shilling or half a crown.”

The exhibition will primarily focus on images drawn from the extensive collections at the Lewis Walpole Library that announce, depict and satirise what people paid to gaze at.  It will consider how derogatory ideas about spectacle were expressed in caricatures and political discourse.  Admission charges made shows less accessible for some, but spectacle blurred the line between high and low culture, fine art and performance.  Who ultimately judged what was “eminently remarkable” in an unashamedly commercial context?  At the heart of this equation were the spectators, united by the impulse of curiosity but far from homogenous, and at times, making a spectacle of themselves.

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Thomas Patch: Artist and Entrepreneur in Eighteenth-Century Florence

Hugh Belsey, Guest Curator

On view Fall 2025

Known primarily as a caricature artist, Thomas Patch (1725-1782) in fact engaged in a much wider array of activities. He was a landscape painter, experimental printmaker, and a dealer of antiquities and old master paintings. He was also among the first scholars of early Renaissance art.  This exhibition will explore the many aspects of Patch’s art, life, and associations with the British community of diplomats, tourists, artists, and collectors in Italy. 

Our current exhibits can be seen here. 

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