New paintings and regular art updates.
Found an old photo of my mural of Walter a regular at the Leopard Hotel in Burslem, the other picture is my reimagined portrait of Molly Leigh, based on the mural I did of her. Both murals were destroyed when the pub burnt down a couple of years ago. I might try and recreate the Walter one too. The final photo is of my Molly Leigh painting and my Spode circular window painting in the Orme Art Group Exhibition at the Brampton museum and art gallery in Newcastle under Lyme. It’s on at the moment.
My portrait of Molly Leigh the Burslem Witch. Painted after my mural of her at the Leopard Hotel in Burslem burnt down a couple of years ago. Acrylic on canvas.
It was used as a prop in the Who is Molly Leigh? opera that was on last week. I was so proud and excited to be able to display it in public. I like creating narrative pieces of art as well as portrait so of people which I would say is my speciality. I’d like to poss create further portraits of Stoke-on-Trent famous people… Just a thought.
On the 5th of June 1925 City status was bestowed on Stoke-on-Trent. So today we celebrated it’s Centenary.
A few years before on 31st of March 1910 it’s six towns of Longton, Burslem, Hanley, Fenton, Tunstall and Stoke-upon-Trent joined to gather to become the County Borough of Stoke-on-Trent.
Notable for living in the city were Oliver Lodge, inventor of the spark plug. Josiah Wedgwood inventor of different types of fine pottery. HG Wells lived here for a while in 1888. And Arnold Bennett, the author of the five towns novels wrote many books about the area.
On 5th July 2025 our area of Penkhull will be putting on a Mystery Play about a reimagined story of how the six towns were named.
Happy anniversary Stoke-on-Trent.
I went to an event planning meeting today at BArts in Stoke. It’s going to be an opera based on the witch (wise woman) from Burslem, Stoke-on-Trent, who was alive in the 17th and 18th centuries. She was buried at 90 degrees to the normal North South orientation.
From Wikipedia :
Margaret ‘Molly’ Leigh (1685–March 1748) was an English property owner in the Staffordshire town of Burslem who, in her will, left substantial sums to charity. She was also accused of witchcraft, and, after her death, her grave was disturbed following claims she was haunting the town.
We had a singing session based on some of her life and the treatment she received from her neighbours. We were also invited to create some art based on her life. (hence the tub of pencil crayons. The opera is due to be put on later this summer.
One of my murals from the Leopard Hotel in Burslem. Stoke-on-Trent. Sadly lost in a fire. Brindley, Wedgwood, and two other people involved are depicted meeting at the Leopard to plan the work. It’s been several years since I painted it and I can’t remember the other names so if anyone knows please tell me. This was emulsion paint directly onto lining paper on the wall.
I’ve just been told the other two were Erasmus Darwin and Thomas Bentley. Thanks to my friend Greg Stephens for the info.
My friend sent me this photo (I don’t have an attribution for it). This was a few year’s ago when it was open and the Leopard Hotel was running ghost tours and serving lovely food.
Then one of the owners died and it was taken over by a family member. I don’t know what happened but I think Covid didn’t help. In the end it closed and the owner moved elsewhere. Although the frontage looked OK it needed a tremendous amount of money spending on it as it was partly derelict in the back upper floors.
The hotel stood empty for months, it was bought by an entrepreneur who may have been going to turn it into flats. Unfortunately someone got in and apparently set up a cannabis farm in it (what I heard). Then it simply burnt down. Some of the frontage may remain but the place is boarded up.
I was involved for a while because I painted the murals in the back room, the Arnold Bennett Suite. I never got decent photos in there. I do hope it can be restored.
I’m sad to say that I didn’t get my painting of Molly Leigh the Burslem witch into the three counties open exhibition this year. (Staffordshire, Cheshire and Shropshire).
I know they had over 200 entries and it depends who is selecting the works of art. I also know that the exhibition has to be cohesive and not too eclectic. So will I enter again? Yes, but I will probably choose to do something less specific. But I’m glad I painted this.
The reason why? I painted something similar to this as a mural in the Leopard Hotel in Burslem, Stoke-on-Trent, several years ago. The building burned down a couple of years ago and I wanted to try and recreate the memory of it. The painting means a lot more to me than getting it in this competition. X
Calling this finished, I could keep fighting her but I’m struggling. The face is loosley based on a portrait of a French peasant woman by Theodore Gericault. Now I can have a rest, that was hard work.
This is hard work, I don’t shake as much when I’m concentrating but the tremors of Parkinsons make small details difficult. I try and hold my breath and clamp my arm against my body. In fact I’m having to redo sections because I’m not happy with the results, but I will persevere, memory of Molly, work in progress. Acrylic on canvas. Copy of a mural I did at the Leopard Hotel in Burslem, Stoke-on-Trent. Difficult to reproduce the same feeling.
I painted this mural several years ago on the wall in the Arnold Bennett suite in the Leopard Hotel in Burslem, Stoke-on-Trent. The building sadly burnt down on 22nd January 2023 and remains a burned out husk of the former historical hotel.
It represents the Burslem witch Molly Leigh.
Margaret ‘Molly’ Leigh was an English property owner in the Staffordshire town of Burslem who, in her will, left substantial sums to charity. She was also accused of witchcraft, and, after her death, her grave was disturbed following claims she was haunting the town. Wikipedia
Born 1685, died 1746.
Her grave is in a Burslem church yard and is set at 90° to the other graves to indicate witchcraft.
My painting shows her old cottage and medicinal plants such as foxgloves. It’s a moonlit night and I painted a ring of icy cloud around the moon to make it more spooky. The ancient woman depicted is actually based on a French peasant woman by Theodore Gericault.
Mallaband-Brown