Sisters coming home.

Bronte Parsonage Museum

Look out for us on BBC Look North (Yorkshire) at 6.30pm this evening as we welcome Branwell's portrait of his sisters back to Haworth.

THE BRONTË Sisters are coming home to Haworth in the shape of their famous portrait.

The painting by Branwell Brontë is the only known surviving portrait of his sisters Charlotte, Emily and Anne.

The National Portrait Gallery is loaning the picture to the Brontë Parsonage Museum for visitors to examine, from June 1 to August 31.

The painting was painted by Branwell in 1834 and is known as the ‘pillar portrait’ due to the central column he painted to obscure his own figure. 

The painting was kept by Charlotte’s husband, Mr Nicholls, and after his death it was discovered folded up in the top of the wardrobe.

It was acquired by the National Portrait Gallery 1914, and this will be its first return to the Parsonage since 1984.

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An Evening with Sally Wainwright & Ann Dinsdale.

On 19 April 2017, the Brontë Society and Ilkley Literature Festival hosted a very special evening with writer and producer Sally Wainwright and Principal Curator of the Brontë Society Ann Dinsdale. From Sparkhouse (2002) to To Walk Invisible (2016), Sally and Ann traced their fascination with the world’s most absorbing literary family and discussed the months of work that went into Wainwright’s hugely successful biopic, from early script research through to casting, set design and filming. The evening was recorded for posterity, and the audio can be streamed above.

Sally Wainwright was born in Huddersfield, West Yorkshire. She is a BAFTA award-winning writer and director, whose work includes At Home With the Braithwaites (2000); Scott & Bailey (2011); Last Tango in Halifax (2012) and Happy Valley (2014). To Walk Invisible aired to great acclaim in December 2016.

Ann Dinsdale is Principal Curator at the Brontë Parsonage Museum, where she has worked for over twenty five years. She has written extensively on the Brontë family and her works include The Brontës at Haworth (2006) and At Home with the Brontës (2013).

Listen: 

bronte.org.uk/contemporary-arts/an-evening-with-sally-wainwright-and-ann-dinsdale-listen-again

Sew Near - Sew Far.

Sew Near - Sew Far, a land art commission created by textile artist Lynn Setterington and over one hundred local people, was displayed along the Brontë Way, West Yorkshire, during the autumn of 2017 as part of the Brontë Parsonage Museum’s five-year programme celebrating the bicentenaries of the Brontës’ births.
 
Sew Near - Sew Far, a collaboration between celebrated textile artist Lynn Setterington and the Brontë Parsonage Museum, saw a large-scale textile artwork at three sites on the Brontë Way; each one celebrating the famous signatures of the literary sisters.
 
Artist Lynn Setterington said: “Signatures are an important marker of identity and the Brontë sisters famously used pseudonyms at their time of writing to disguise the fact they were women.
 
“I’m creating an artwork for the Brontë Parsonage Museum exploring the adopted and real signatures of Charlotte, Emily and Anne Brontë. I’ll be working with local people to develop the artworks and inviting them to add their own signatures to the piece.
 
“We’re also creating a film documenting the whole process, which will be shown later in the year. I’ll be collaborating with community groups, volunteers and local people in West Yorkshire to create Sew Near - Sew Far and capturing the process is an important part of the artwork.” bronte.org.uk/contemporary-arts/sew-near-sew-far-by-lynn-setterington