It seems very possible that the model for ‘The Red Lacquer Cabinet’ was the artist’s wife, Madeleine Ellen Sayer. There is another painting by Barnes called ‘Portrait of my Wife’ which was reproduced in The Sphere magazine in 1926.

Despite this the artist has chosen to place a cupboard (albeit a very pretty one) in the foreground of the painting and the human woman is merely decoration, along with the vase.

We have a number of letters between the curator in Oldham and Kelly in the 1920s and 1930s. There is lots of discussion about some alleged damage to some frames. Kelly says they must be repaired in London as "what is dangerous is having them done [repaired] locally, with Judson's gold paint, and other horrors.", but at no point is there any discussion about the subject of the painting. The identity of the sitter does not appear to be relevant to the artist or the curator, as she is merely an archetype of an "exotic" woman from South-East Asia.

Here is another painting where an object takes the title. We are still working on finding out more about the sitter in the painting. To do this we will ask for help from the Art Detective site, as well as carrying out our own research. Anyone with an interest in art and basic research skills can be an ‘Art Detective’. Find out more here https://www.artuk.org/artdetective/about.

Ann Todd was born Dorothy Anne Todd in 1907 in Cheshire. She was a child actor in the 1920s, appeared in films from the 1930s and performed in theatres in London during the 1940s.

Todd starred in the hit film ‘The Seventh Veil’ opposite James Mason. She appeared on television in ‘Maigret’ in 1992. She was famous for refusing to talk about her marriages and for throwing out of her flat ‘showbiz’ journalists who had arranged to interview her. In her obituary in The Stage of May 1993 she was described as ‘quite simply one of Britain’s most intelligent and intellectual actresses.’

Mary Wimpenny, George’s wife, was 63 when this painting was made, so it’s possible she is the sitter. Mary was 36 when she married and ten years older than George. Her occupation is given as dressmaker on her marriage certificate. However, in the 1881 census Mary was living at home in Chadderton and her occupation was ‘nurse’.

We think it’s possible that the seated woman in this painting is Gertrude Bodinnar, an artist’s model and the wife of the artist. They were married in 1911, having met when Bodinnar modelled for Harvey. He painted “Gertrude in the Kitchen at Maen Cottage, Newlyn’ in 1927. The model in that painting does not look much like the model in ‘My Kitchen’, however there are some earlier paintings of Gertrude in 1917 and 1918 which are closer in looks to the seated woman in the painting ‘My Kitchen’.

This painting names and shows Hélène Rouart, but everything around her belongs to her father. The enormous chair blocks our view of the woman named in the portrait. The Egyptology and paintings are designed to show a man of wealth and taste. Hélène was married by then so Rouart was no longer her surname, and preliminary sketches show her wedding ring on her hand. Degas chose not to include this in the final painting, which has the effect of making it seem that Hélène is another one of his possessions.

In this exhibition we are considering the difference between a painting of a person and a portrait. A portrait usually tells you something about the person depicted. We believe this is a painting of Hélène but a portrait of her father Henri.

Liverpool-born Thomas Mostyn was known to paint family members. In 1919 he painted ‘The Green Gown’, which features his daughter Marjory.
Mostyn grew up in Manchester and later moved to Torquay in Devon. He had many female relatives but this model was probably a local sitter from the Totnes area, possibly from the local Art School. Her name is unrecorded.

Gywnne-Jones was a solider in WW1, serving in the East Surrey Regiment. We have tried to find the identity of the girl in this painting but we have not managed to yet. We know that she is not the artist’s daughter as she was born 18 years after this work was painted. It is possible that the child in the painting is Ann, the artist’s niece, who would have been the right age in 29/30.

We have previously believed that this painting shows Oldham artist and teacher Annie Maycock on her wedding day. Our volunteer Alison’s research has destroyed this theory though, since Maycock married in 1933, 13 years after this work was complete!

Maycock was born in 1890, so would have been 30 at the time this painting was completed. It is possible that the painting shows her, but it is not her wedding day. Or it is possible that it shows someone else on her wedding day.

We are continuing with our research to try to find out how the story that it was Maycock on her wedding day came about. We will keep you posted…

Patti Mayor was an artist and a suffragette. She was born in Preston in 1872. One of the reasons given for only men to vote was that women did not contribute to the economy. This was untrue in many areas of the country, but especially in the north west of England, where women were employed in many key roles in the cotton industry. Mayor took her paintings of mill workers on suffragette protest marches to make this point.

Damilola was a friend of the artist when he moved from Nigeria to London in 2007. She was a fellow-Nigerian who had been in the UK for a while and was able to help him learn about the customs of his new home. Damilola seems relaxed and is comfortable meeting our gaze. She is very much a real human, not just an object for us to admire.

We do not know the identity of this “girl”, although we have tried to find out. We haven’t given up though and will update this label during the exhibition if we manage to get any more information via Art UK’s Art Detective project.

This painting shows a confident young woman who is happy to meet our gaze. She looks as if she has perhaps been interrupted in her working day. She has dirt under her fingernails if you look closely.

Dorothy and Marjory were the daughters of Sarah Lees, who portrait you can see to the right on this wall.

Dorothy was born in 1876 and was a generous supporter of causes close to her heart. She gave a strip of land to Hulme Grammar School, supported various hospitals an colleges in the north-west. Dorothy married and had two children, and seems to disappear from public life in the 1920s. She died in 1933 aged 57.

Marjory was born in 1878 and was a lifelong campaigner for women’s rights, like her mother, Sarah Lees. She was a supporter of many charities in Oldham, with a particular interest in preserving our green spaces. She also donated to the gallery Circe offering the cup to Ulysses, which you can see further along this wall. Circe had

Sarah Lees was born Sarah Ann Buckley in Mossley in 1842. She spent many years campaigning for equal rights for woman, and in 1910 became one of the first two female mayors in the UK. This was eight years before some women (over 30 and with a certain level of income) got the vote, and 18 years before every woman in England was allowed to vote.

This painting shows two sisters, Nasreen and Shazia. Nasreen is the older sister and the one on the left. Nasreen was a friend of the artist and struggled with degenerative MS and cerebral palsy. Despite this she wanted freedom to work and make her own decisions. She moved away from her family, married and had a child, but sadly died soon after giving birth. Shazia followed more conventional lines, marrying and having a baby.

The artist sees their story as symbolic of the decisions faced by those growing up in any culture – we all have to make decisions whether to follow convention or fight against tradition.

Circe was a sorcerer who was banished to the (mythical) island of Aiaia in the eastern Mediterranean Sea, by her father Helios, the sun god. She lived alone on this island for many years, until Ulysses, known in Greek myths as Odysseus, arrived on his way back home from the Trojan War. Circe changed Ulysses’ men into pigs, and you can see one of them at her feet in this painting. You can see Ulysses approaching her in the mirror. Author Madeline Miller’s 2018 novel Circe is a really engaging (but sometimes pretty brutal) re-telling of this well-known myth from Circe’s point of view. Oldham Libraries have plenty of copies if you fancy borrowing it.