West Park - Shinning a Light on our Artwork.
West park museum is located on Prestbury Road in Macclesfield. It was donated by Marianne and Peter Brocklehurst to the public and it has been open since 1898. The Brocklehurst’s Ancient Egyptian collections are available to the public for free and is a well know Macclesfield attraction.
In our artwork of this building we wanted to show the interesting past it holds and it's unique quirks. This mainly includes egyptian themes and Mariannes legacy.
The rays of light emitting from the building have 'Happiness', 'Women' and 'Love' written in hyroglyphs to represent her love for Mary Booth. The hyroglyphs round the edge of the building say panda which relates to the famous panda that lives inside.
More panda references are located at the bottom and the left of the picture hiding in the bushes. Also shown at the front of the building is a billboard for her famous book 'A Thousand Miles up the Nile' which was published in 1877.
The giant shadow on the building is the egyptian god Ra. Ra was the king of the deities and the father of all creation. He is mainly know as the god of the sun, heaven, kingship, power, and light. We created a reflection of the sun next to the shadow to show the connection to the sun god.
The bollards have been replaced with djed-pilllars which were primarily associated with themes of rebirth and regeneration.The djed-pillar was designed as a symbol of Osiris and later came to be understood as a representation of his backbone
In this last image we have a scarab beetle which was one of the most popular amulets in ancient Egypt because the insect was a symbol of the sun god Ra while also being a symbol of renewal and rebirth. Then finally we have Marianne Brocklehurst on a horse hiding in the background.
Love your depiction of this beautiful, atmospheric museum which once held Marianne Brocklehurst’s treasures and many more interesting artefacts related to Charles Tunnicliffe and Macclesfield’s history. I like the way you have woven so much of Marianne’s story into your depictions of the museum. It is a tragedy that this wonderful museum now stands empty of it’s treasures, some of which are now housed in the Silk Museum, Macclesfield. A dreadful waste of a unique building! Thank you for capturing it’s story in your art work and let us hope that one day it will be returned to public usage to reflect this fascinating part of Macclesfield’s history.