Imperial Connections: Re-examining Kedleston Hall, Derbyshire
Lead Research Organisation:
University of Birmingham
Department Name: History and Cultures
Abstract
Lord Curzon described the Governor's house in Calcutta (now Raj Bhavan, Kolkata), modelled on Kedleston Hall as, 'without doubt the finest Government House ... in the world' (Curzon, 1925). This statement highlights the inherent connections between empire and Curzon's ancestral seat, and Curzon's belief in Kedleston's architectural superiority. Curzon's judgement of Kedleston's style would provide my frame for this project.
Style can be understood as working to define 'a playing field', or a social space with tacit rules (Bourdieu, 1977, 1992). Asserting 'difference' has been identified as a key colonial strategy (Hall, 2000, Rao, 2010, Qureshi, 2011, Barczewski 2014). Style asserts difference through affirming and expressing the rules of particular nationalities, races, classes or genders. Combining archival research, visual and object analysis, and material culture methods grounded in anthropology and sociology, my approach will explore the interaction between a classicizing 'home' locale, and a collection of 'Eastern' objects, concerned with the agency of style, as foil and frame.
Understanding the arguments that Kedleston makes stylistically, (for example, for Britain's Roman inheritance) and how and why this was exported to and mobilised in India, would provide a new understanding of Curzon's take on the relationships between objects, display and power, orient and occident, as manifested in his collection. It will also provide the context in which to understand the collection's consequent display in each of its incarnations. Tensions of appropriation and assimilation within this classicising framework will be central to tracking the transformation of the objects' meanings and autonomy throughout the process of acquisition, display, and reception.
My proposed research is underpinned by my record as a Curator of Decorative Arts with over a decade working in historic houses and museums. In 2017 I co-curated a display about a nineteenth-century silver testimonial in the Gilbert Collection. Subsequently, I was invited to write an article that shifted focus from making, the subject of previous research (Eatwell, 2015), to scrutinise its colonial history. This article tested the ideas described above: exploring how the neoclassical wine cooler asserted cultural difference through its ornament, enacting social difference and making claims for the superiority of the colonial government.
As a museum professional adept at managing and contributing to collaborative research projects with public-engagement outcomes, the collegiate approach of this project greatly appeals to me. My networks from the Courtauld, the V&A and beyond would complement those of the advisory panel, and aid access to V&A objects.
Style can be understood as working to define 'a playing field', or a social space with tacit rules (Bourdieu, 1977, 1992). Asserting 'difference' has been identified as a key colonial strategy (Hall, 2000, Rao, 2010, Qureshi, 2011, Barczewski 2014). Style asserts difference through affirming and expressing the rules of particular nationalities, races, classes or genders. Combining archival research, visual and object analysis, and material culture methods grounded in anthropology and sociology, my approach will explore the interaction between a classicizing 'home' locale, and a collection of 'Eastern' objects, concerned with the agency of style, as foil and frame.
Understanding the arguments that Kedleston makes stylistically, (for example, for Britain's Roman inheritance) and how and why this was exported to and mobilised in India, would provide a new understanding of Curzon's take on the relationships between objects, display and power, orient and occident, as manifested in his collection. It will also provide the context in which to understand the collection's consequent display in each of its incarnations. Tensions of appropriation and assimilation within this classicising framework will be central to tracking the transformation of the objects' meanings and autonomy throughout the process of acquisition, display, and reception.
My proposed research is underpinned by my record as a Curator of Decorative Arts with over a decade working in historic houses and museums. In 2017 I co-curated a display about a nineteenth-century silver testimonial in the Gilbert Collection. Subsequently, I was invited to write an article that shifted focus from making, the subject of previous research (Eatwell, 2015), to scrutinise its colonial history. This article tested the ideas described above: exploring how the neoclassical wine cooler asserted cultural difference through its ornament, enacting social difference and making claims for the superiority of the colonial government.
As a museum professional adept at managing and contributing to collaborative research projects with public-engagement outcomes, the collegiate approach of this project greatly appeals to me. My networks from the Courtauld, the V&A and beyond would complement those of the advisory panel, and aid access to V&A objects.