The Munnings Art Museum owns the largest collection of oil and watercolour paintings by Sir Alfred Munnings anywhere in the world. There are 638 oil paintings, a significant number of which are oil sketches and preparatory works for finished paintings. Much of the collection was given by Violet Munnings to the Castle House Trust, which she established in 1966. 28 paintings were bought by the trustees between 1973 and 1984. Half of these form the recognisable core of the collection today. They include, “Daniel Tomkins”, 1898, “Suffolk Horse Fair, Lavenham”, 1901, “Path to the Orchard”, 1908, (above),”Shrimp Leading Ponies Across a Norfolk Common”, 1910, “Tagg’s Island”, 1919 and “Sir Raymond Greene Bt DSO MP on Horseback”, 1919.
The collection contains 3,000 drawings, 60 sketchbooks and rare pieces of sculpture. Many of the drawings and sketches relate to finished paintings in both public and private collections in the United Kingdon and abroad. The earliest drawings were made by Munnings at the age of six. There are several sketchbooks filled during his time at Norwich School of Art in the 1890s and some of the latest drawings are rapid sketches conveying racehorses in only a few lines done by the side of the racecourses at Newmarket, Ascot and others.
The museum owns rare poster designs by Munnings, done during his apprenticeship with Page Bros in Norwich during the 1890s. Adverts for chocolate, Colman’s Mustard, Caley’s Crackers are all designed with the Art Nouveau aesthetic, which was quickly learnt by a young Munnings and the designs present a host of attractive ladies in “charming dresses”.
All oil paintings, sculpture and a growing number of watercolour paintings, drawings and poster designs in the museum’s collection are available to view on the Art UK website. Munnings Art Museum is a founder partner of Art UK.
The Munnings Art Museum
