Sydenham, which is a prosperous suburb in the south-east of London, already has a place in art history. The French Impressionist painter, Camille Pissarro, came to live nearby in Norwood in order to escape the Franco-Prussian war in 1870-71, and painted many pictures while he was there. One of the largest, and the best-known, is The Avenue, Sydenham, which now hangs in the National Gallery. It is a sparklingly fresh picture of spring in a broad, leafy street that is still immediately recognisable, with St Bartholomew’s church at the end of the vista. Only the coach and horses going straight down the middle of the road have gone, and given way to buses on either side.

Now Sydenham has an art gallery, probably the first ever in its high street. It is called the Lovely Gallery. This might sound a very coy name – except for the fact that the gallery owner’s name is Anna-Maria Lovely. Her father is the artist Patrick (or Paddy) Lovely, she is herself an artist who studied at the Camberwell Art School and the Royal Academy schools, and her daughter Bonnie is an art student.

How and why does one start an art gallery? Anna’s partner died three years ago, and she was left with a house in Dulwich, not far from Sydenham. She gave a show in the house of work by some of her many artist friends, and rather liked doing it. It also gave her an idea of a future for herself.

She looked around, and in Sydenham found a large, empty shop that used to sell shabby-chic furniture. It had a big, open floor space and a flat above. She resolved to sell her house and buy it.

Now it is a bright white space, with a view through to a long garden at the back, lamps in the ceiling that floodlight the walls, picture windows on the street, and the name ‘The Lovely Gallery’ above the door.

What and who would she show? She began, feeling her way, earlier this year. In February, she had an exhibition of work by sixth-form art students at the local Forest Hill School, and two of them have now got places at art colleges. She had a small exhibition of five artists who were friends. As a landscape painter and a teacher of life drawing herself, she plans at first to show mainly landscapes and portraits, but she is open-minded about how the gallery will develop. In fact, inspired by her daughter, she had an evening in the half-finished gallery called ‘Beat your phobias!’ In the middle of the room there was an enormous papier mâché monster, half spider, half bird, and people who came were encouraged to hit it. Meanwhile a woman with a snake sat at a table, inviting people to discuss their phobias and stroke the snake. This was full-scale interactive art!

She has now held her first large exhibition – her Spring Show of paintings, drawings and prints, which ran for two weeks in May. There were ten artists in it. Some of them were artists whom she has known since her student days, and are now members of the Royal Watercolour Society or the long-established London Group, such as the evocative portrait painter Julie Held. Others were artists she has come to know over the years from their own shows, or from sharing teaching with them.

Patrick Lovely featured in it with some bold and witty works. There was a fine painting by him of wild boars snuffling in a dark wood near his home in the south of France – and a wood carving, called Elvis Pig, of a boar’s head with an Elvis-like quiff made of a clothes brush. There was a picture called Leonardo Supermarket with the assembled heads of many figures from Leonardo da Vinci’s paintings, and a large, striking oil of a Leonardesque woman with downcast eyes holding a pelican in her lap. His works always sell well. Other artists included Martin Le Morvan, a landscape architect, with his rich, dark landscape paintings, and Paul Newland with his mysterious, mist-haunted scenes. Some of the illustrations accompanying this article are pictures by other contributors in the show. It’s made a big impression on the Sydenham high street, attracted many visitors, and did well.

Prices ranged from £400 for small works to around £4,000 for larger pieces. Anna’s arrangement with the artists on show is that the gallery charges them altogether £200 a week, divided between them. Her commission on work that is sold is also lower than that of most galleries.This is a fairly new kind of arrangement in the art world, but one that has found favour among artists.

She also holds art classes in the gallery, and will let it out for other events. For instance, there is a woman in Sydenham from the London College of Fashion who arranges what she calls Secret Suppers in various venues, and the secret diners have met once among the pictures in the Lovely Gallery. A degree of diversification is called for in most professions today!

Anyway, if another French refugee artist should come to Sydenham (and there seem to be plenty of refugees from Paris in London nowadays), this time he or she will find a gallery waiting for them.

 

 

 

The Lovely Gallery, 140 Sydenham Road, SE26 5JZ. 020 3686 1328.
www.thelovelygallery.com

Thursday-Saturday 11-5pm, Sunday 12-5pm