Symposium held in celebration of the success of the De Morgan Foundation s Sublime Symmetry exhibition, on the centenary of William De Morgan s Death. De Morgan House, 57 58 Russell Sq, London, WC1B 4HS Friday 13 th January 2017, 9.30am to 5.00pm 09.30 Registration Tea and coffee will be served 10.00 Welcome Jean McMeakin, Director, De Morgan Foundation Trustee Jean will introduce the theme of the day, the De Morgan Foundation and the Sublime Symmetry Exhibition 10.15 A Potted History of William De Morgan and the De Morgan Collection. Claire Longworth, Curator, The De Morgan Foundation The designs of William De Morgan are instantly recognisable and have stood the test of time as fitting in a 21 st -century interior as they were in a 19 th -century one. Claire Longworth will delve into the history and personality of the man who made the pots. 10.50 De Morgan and Divine Geometry Prof Anne Anderson FSA, Hon. Associate Professor Exeter University and Course Tutor V&A People normally associate the Arts and Crafts with radical politics but many of the artists and architects involved were also nonconformists. Their patrons were often Quakers, Unitarians or Theosophists. During the 1890s both artists and patrons were drawn to mysticism and spiritualism. The De Morgans were no exception: their circle numbered Unitarians, including the Earl of Lovelace, Ada's son and Evelyn was photographed experimenting with automatic writing. Mrs Mary Watts, with whom Evelyn had studied at the Slade, expressed her interest in comparative religions on the ceiling of her home Limerslease and by building and decorating the Compton Mortuary Chapel. In 1891 William Lethaby published Architecture Mysticism and Myth, which laid stress on divine numbers and divine geometry. Although this fascination with divine patterns may appear too close to Dan Brown's Da Vinci code to be taken seriously, I believe it is important to address the Arts and Crafts desire to find spiritual meaning in life.
11.25 DeMorganitis: the unwillingness to let go the sublime. Dr Christopher Jordan, Independent Historian Appreciation of William de Morgan s ceramics may have waned post 1900 but the flame was kept alight by enthusiastic collectors, who after WWI sought both institutional reappraisal of his artistic achievement and re-introduction of production of his designs. This talk presents research in progress on the lobbying and other activities of collector Harold Mossop and the establishment by Mrs Ida Perrin, in collaboration with Fred Passenger, of the Bushey Heath Pottery. 12.00 Panel Discussions and Questions The morning s speakers will take questions about any aspect of De Morgan s work and practice, the legacy of his work or collecting De Morgan ceramics. Please come prepared to ask questions. 12.15 Lunch Join us for a buffet lunch and the opportunity to meet speakers and other delegates. 13.15 Sublime Symmetry: The Mathematics behind De Morgan s Ceramic designs Sarah Hardy, Exhibition Curator, Sublime Symmetry Sublime Symmetry has been the De Morgan Foundation s most successful exhibition, welcoming 45,000 visitors to date. In this talk I will discuss the exhibition concept and planning and present the research I have undertaken for the exhibition. I will explore earlier observations made about De Morgan which champion him as an able mathematician and, offer a detailed examination of his ceramic design process which show he was a designer with a natural flair for, and deep comprehension of, mathematics. 13.50 The mathematical world of William De Morgan June Barrow-Green, Professor of History of Mathematics, The Open University William De Morgan's father was Augustus De Morgan, Professor of Mathematics at University College London. Augustus De Morgan, who published prodigiously, is well-known for his work in logic, in particular De Morgan's Laws, and as the founding President of the London Mathematical Society. He was also a celebrated teacher and one of his most famous pupils was Ada Lovelace, the daughter of Lord Byron, who is known for her work on Charles Babbage's general purpose computer, the Analytical Engine. William attended some mathematical classes at UCL although perhaps not quite as many as his father would have liked! In this talk I will describe the mathematical world of mid-19th century London and take a brief look at the sort of mathematics that William would have studied.
14.25 A Sublime Approach: The Nature of Harmony Amber Khokhar, Artist and Arts Educator, creator of the Sublime Symmetry education pack. One of the most original craftsmen of the Arts and Crafts Movement, De Morgan was profoundly influenced by the beautifully sophisticated use of geometry and pattern in the ceramic tradition of the Levant, Maghreb and Mashriq. His appreciation, research and understanding of the hidden mathematics within Islamic Art and thus nature, saw the evolution of a 'quintessentially English' aesthetic rooted in the harmony of symmetries, proportions and ratios. In this respect, De Morgan represents modernity and tradition in a way that connects with today s world and certainly reflects my experience and current art practice. His guiding design principles offer an artist educator like myself the opportunity to approach mathematics visually and practically from a sublime perspective. 15.00 Sublime Symmetry: Mathematics and Art Professor Alexandre Borovik, Professor of Mathematics at the University of Manchester Mathematics is the art of precision; it deals with mental constructions and procedures which can be reproduced with arbitrary (you may wish to say, absolute) precision. Symmetry is one of the tools used in mathematics to achieve the desired precision. In my talk, I will explain how this use of symmetry in mathematics links it to symmetry in Art and in Nature. Some of these connections are unexpected and amazing. The works of William De Morgan provide some of the best illustrations of these delicate and sublime interconnections. And I will explain the classical conundrum: why does the mirror change left and right but does not change up and down? 15.35 Panel Discussions and Questions The afternoon s speakers will take questions about any aspect of the Sublime Symmetry exhibition, Augustus De Morgan, William De Morgan and mathematics and mathematics and art. 15.50 Reception The Directors of the De Morgan Foundation Trustee invite you to join them for drinks and canapés to celebrate the Sublime Symmetry Symposium, exhibition and William De Morgan on the centenary of his death.
Speaker Profiles Jean McMeakin, Director, De Morgan Foundation Trustee Jean is the Chair of the Board of Directors of the De Morgan Trustee Company Ltd, the trustee of the De Morgan Foundation which owns the De Morgan Collection of fine and decorative art of the Victorian period by William and Evelyn De Morgan. Jean is also a Trustee of the Friends of Putney School of Art & Design, and is a member of the Advisory Council of the Friends of the British Museum. Before joining De Morgan, Jean was a senior manager at the BBC and worked in various BBC divisions including BBC TV Production, BBC Network Radio and BBC World Service, and sat on two BBC Divisional Boards, the BBC Production Studios Board and the Finance & Business Division Board, and was Chair of the pan-bbc Production Management Strategy Board. Claire Longworth, Curator, De Morgan Foundation Claire Longworth completed her MA in History of Design at the Royal College of Art, London, before going on to work at the V&A. She has taught Design History at several Art Schools including Wimbledon School of Art, Surrey Institute of Art and Design (University of Surrey) and has served on the executive committee of the Design History Society. Claire has lectured extensively about William De Morgan, the Arts and Crafts Movement and Victorian Women Artists and has been the curator of the De Morgan Foundation (the largest collection of the works of William and Evelyn De Morgan) since 2002. Prof. Anne Anderson FSA, Hon. Associate Professor Exeter University and Course Tutor V&A With a first degree in archaeology and a PhD in English, Anne was a senior lecturer in the History of Art and Design at Southampton Solent University for 14 years. She is now a course tutor at the V&A, London, specializing in the Aesthetic Movement, Arts and Crafts, Art Nouveau and Modernism (currently delivering a 10 week course on the A&C). During 2009-2010, Anne worked on Closer to Home the reopening exhibition at Leighton House Museum, Kensington. Her research covered the emergence of collecting Islamic ceramics, namely Leighton s creation of the Arab Hall and how his fine array of Persian and Rhodian pieces were displayed throughout the house. Dr Christopher Jordan, Independent Historian Christopher Jordan was for 13 years Keeper of the South London Gallery Permanent Collection, now the Southwark At Collection. This contains collections of De Morgan, Martinware and other ceramics. His PhD on the Martinware collector Ernest Marsh is published on the University of the Arts London website. He has recently co-curated exhibitions on Martinware at Kingston Museum and the Bushey Heath Pottery at Bushey Museum. He is Chairman of the Spode Society and, amongst other things, currently engaged on researching representations of Wheatley's Cries of London by Spode, George J. Cox and the Mortlake pottery and De Morgan after De Morgan. Sarah Hardy, Exhibition Curator, Sublime Symmetry
Sarah studied History of Art and Sociology at Durham University, before obtaining her MA in Art History at the University of Manchester, with a specialism in Victorian Art and Design. Sarah has worked previously with collections management at Helmshore Mills Textile Museum and as an education officer at Two Temple Place, before commencing her current registrar s role at the National Gallery in London. Sarah has been with the De Morgan Foundation since 2013, working as a freelance exhibition curator and has planned and organised Sublime Symmetry from concept to installation. Prof. June Barrow-Green, Professor of History of Mathematics, The Open University June is a lecturer at the Centre For The History of The Mathematical Sciences with The Open University. She is a member of the Council of the London Mathematical Society and the Librarian for the society. Her current research projects include work of George Birkhoff, and the development of dynamical systems theory, British mathematics of the late 19th and early 20th centuries and have the responses of Cambridge mathematicians to the First World War. Other projects include editing the 1915-1916 diary of a pacifist Cambridge mathematics student, FP White, and the mathematical models of Olaus Henrici, the Danish-born German mathematician who made his career in London. Amber Khokhar, Artist and Arts Educator, creator of the Sublime Symmetry education pack. Artist and designer Amber Khokhar combines her strong background in design with a diverse academic and practical knowledge of Traditional Art to create enchanting designs, paintings and products. An alumni of Central/Saint Martin s, Amber's studies include a British Council scholarship at The Academy of Fine Art, Warsaw and tutelage in Indian Art and Indian Temple Architecture with Dr Pramod Chandra at Harvard University. She holds a Masters in Traditional Art and continues to share her academic and practical knowledge through workshops. As an accomplished educator, Amber has devised practical workshops at schools and museums locally and internationally, she is a Sessional Lecturer at Birkbeck College, London University, where she teaches on the World Art and Artefacts Programme. Prof. Alexandre Borovik, Professor of Mathematics at the University of Manchester Alexandre Borovik is a Professor of Pure Mathematics at the University of Manchester, United Kingdom, where he has been working for the past 20 years. He was born in Russia and graduated from Novosibirsk State University in 1978. His principal research lies in algebra, model theory, and combinatorics topics on which he published several monographs and a number of papers. He also has an interest in mathematical practice and recently published a book Mathematics under the Microscope: Notes on Cognitive Aspects of Mathematical Practice which examines a mathematician's outlook on psychophysiological and cognitive issues in mathematics.