Selby Whittingham
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| birth_place =Batu Gajah, Malaya, now Malaysia
Dr. Selby Whittingham is an eminent art expert in London. Dr. Selby Whittingham is the foremost authority on J.M.W. Turner in England for attributions and for expertise on his life and works. He is an art expert who has published widely, both in forms of books, articles but also reviews of works of others on Turner. Dr Whittingham has contributed much to the scholarship and knowledge or Turner’s life, painting style, and phases of Turner’s production. He is an expert both on oil paintings and watercolours by Turner.
Family
Dr. Selby Whittingham was born in Batu Gajah, Malaya, now Malaysia. His parents were Henry Whittingham and Barbara Whttingham-Jones. He was baptised Jeremy Selby Whittingham Oppenheim in 1941 in Malaya, but dropped the name "Oppenheim" soon after by deed poll due to anti-German feeling then. His father escaped in a rowing boat with an Australian General to India, an escape which became the subject of a parliamentary question to Winston Churchill. Whittingham’s uncle, Sir Duncan Oppenheim, besides his life in business, was an artist and Chairman of the Design Council and of the Royal College of Art as well as a member of the V&A Advisory Council. He paid for the restoration of the organ at St John's Smith Square. His mother, Barbara Whittingham-Jones, was admitted to the bar at Gray's Inn (the youngest woman then?); she was involved in politics with Randolph Churchill, and subsequently worked in journalism and as a historian, but died young.
Education
Selby Whittingham holds several academic degrees[1] He was educated at Shrewsbury School, Oriel College, University of Oxford, and at the University of Manchester. After attending Shrewsbury School he filled his semi-gap year by attending the French Civilisation Course at the Sorbonne, University of Paris, and as an assistant at the National Portrait Gallery at the invitation of the Director. At Oxford he studied Mods and Greats, (Classics or Literae Humaniores). He was awarded a Doctorate in Art History at the University of Manchester for a thesis on Realism in Medieval Portraiture.
Career and Interest in Turner
It was as a young man that Selby Whittingham began to take a special interest in J.W.M. Turner. His father had the same name as his ancestor, Henry Oppenheim, who was a neighbour of Benjamin Godfrey Windus, whose correspondence with Turner and Ruskin he discovered and published. This work is now the subject of a new film production.
After Oxford, Whittingham was an unpaid assistant in the Conway Library at the Courtauld Institute of Art and then went to Manchester City Art Gallery as a trainee assistant for 2 years. Professor C.R.Dodwell became Director of the Whitworth Art Gallery and head of the Art History Department and invited him to do a PhD on "Realism in Mediaeval Art", a subject on which his late mother had encouraged him to embark him years before. He worked as a temporary assistant at the National Portrait Gallery and was then appointed assistant keeper at Manchester City Art Gallery in 1975. The same year he In 1975 he rejoined the staff of Manchester City Art Gallery, and founded the Turner Society.
Dr. Selby Whittingham had written about the failures over the Turner Gallery some years before in Crossbow. He had read the standard biography of Turner (by A.J.Finberg) castigating that failure. He was an admirer of John Ruskin and involved with the fine collections of Turner watercolours at Manchester. The Royal Academy held an exhibition to mark the bicentenary of Turner's birth 1974-5 (which the Tate tried to appropriate). In fact it ended before the bicentenary on 23 April 1975. That and the long dissatisfaction over the Turner Bequest prompted correspondence in The Times, as there had been in 19th century, 1906-10, 1916 etc., with protests by many - Lord Burnham, Lord Beaverbrook, artists, historians etc.). Sir john Betjeman wrote proposing that the Turners be moved to the Fine Rooms at Somerset House. He was supported by Henry Moore and later by Lord Clark and Sir Hugh Casson.
Dr. Whittingham had already launched the proposal for a Turner Society to reunite the Turner Bequest in a separate Turner Gallery (with no mention of Somerset House). Henry Moore became its President, and Vice-Presidents included the Earl of Harewood, John Piper, Victor Pasmore etc. The American Turner collector, Dr Kurt F. Pantzer, gave the society shares worth £20,000. Although it had been Dr Whittinghman who had founded the original Turner Society, he found that this Society was too much in the hands of others so he then founded The Independent Turner Society. The Independent Turner Society has published numerous studies relating to Turner's paintings, bequests, family, English tours etc.
Dr. Whittingham organised the Turner Symposium at the University of York in 1980 and the International Colloquium on Artists’ Museums at the University of Paris in 1990). the Independent Turner Society and He was the UK ambassador for the Turner Museum, USA, in 2009.
Publications
Dr. Selby Whittingham has published some books and a vast number articles, for example:
- An Historical Account of the Will of J.M.W.Turner, R.A. , 5 fascicules, 415 pp. ISBN 1 874564 01 9, Independent Turner Society, 2nd edition, 1993-1996;
- The Fallacy of Mediocrity: The Need for a Proper Turner Gallery, 4 fascicules, ISBN 1 874564 00 0.
Independent Turner Society, 1992;
- English Watercolours and Drawings from the Manchester City Art Gallery, Thos. Agnew and Sons Ltd, October 1977, Catalogue by Selby Whittingham (nos 93-116 Turner watercolours);
- Of Geese, Mallards and Drakes: Some Notes on Turner’s Family, with contributions from others, Parts 1-4. The Danbys, 1993, 138 pp., ISBN 1 874564 27 2; The Turners of Devon, 1995, 134 pp, ISBN 1 874564 32 9; Mrs Booth of Margate, 1996, 144 pp, ISBN 1 874564 42 6; The Marshalls & Harpurs, 1999, 290 pp., in 2 fascicules, ISBN 1 874564 37 X, Independent Turner Society, 1993-1999.
- The World Directory of Artists’ Museums, Lists some 500 museums, houses, monuments, libraries, including those which no longer exist, 148 pp., ISBN 1 874564 02 7, Independent Turner Society, 1995.
- Ruskin’s Guide to the Turners in the Clore Gallery, Ed. With Robert Walmsley, ISBN 1 874564 12 4, Independent Turner Society;
- ‘Turner, Ruskin and Constable at Salisbury’, The Burlington Magazine, CXIII, May 1971, pp. 272-5
- ‘A Vision of the First Proper National “Turner’s Gallery”’, Independent Turner Society, 2007;
- Ruskin as Turner’s Executor, Essay and documents, 70 pp. ISBN 1 874564 22 1, Independent Turner Society, 1995;
- ‘Turner Exhibited 1856-61, Critique of the Turner Bequest pictures’, 1856-61, 78 pages. ISBN 1 874564 07 8, Independent Turner Society, 1995;
- ‘Can trustees be trusted?’, Donor Watch, ArtWatch Journal, Issue 9;
- ‘The Fates of the Jesse Window’, ArtWatch Journal, Issue 10;
- ‘The Foundling Hospital and its Museum’, ArtWatch Journal, Issue 13;
- ‘The Biter Bit: Ruskin and Turner’s Fading Watercolours’, ArtWatch Journal, Issue 14;
- ‘Turner and Girtin: A Postscript’, ArtWatch Journal, Issue 16;
- ‘Visit to the Tomb: The Deaths of Turner and his Works’, ArtWatch Journal, Issue 19;
References