18th and 19th Century Industrial South Wales in Art

The pre-Christmas appearance of Brian Davies, former curator of Pontypridd Museum, at Cowbridge U3A’s History Group in December has become as much a tradition as decorated trees, mulled wine, mince pies and transport disruption.

This time the subject of his illustrated talk (delivered, as usual, without the aid of notes) was the Art of Industrial South Wales, from the mid 18th century to the late 19th century. Not the most interesting subject, one might think, to non-specialists, but Brian’s presentations are tailored to his audience, with humour and no “highbrow” jargon.

The audience was informed that the greatest regional concentration of industrial paintings in Europe and, perhaps, even the world, is of South Wales, but, unfortunately, no outstanding collection of such paintings is actually held in Wales.

The first group of landscapes displayed revealed an area still largely bucolic in character; Ibbetson’s 1790 “Bridge of Beauty”, now on display at Pontypridd Museum (purchased for £24,000), shows the new bridge at Pontypridd in the distance and depicts a rural scene, as did a picture of the forge at Trostrey. There was even an 1850s painting of Mountain Ash with a countryside of golden autumn colours and only a few small collieries in view.

Industrialisation had started in South Wales as early as the reign of Elizabeth I, with copper smelting at Aberdulais and a blast furnace at Tintern. By the early 18th century, industry had increased substantially, with iron-making in Pontypool, extensive copper smelting in Neath and Swansea and coalmining in Glamorgan. This was all captured in paintings.

The great iron works of the 19th century in Merthyr, Blaenavon and Nantyglo furnished the subject of many of the works that were shown, as artists had a fascination with the colours (black smoke, red fires) that were generated by the blast furnaces, both by day and by night. Paintings showed how humans had the ability to alter the landscape completely, with green fields and trees being replaced by industry, with its multitude of chimneys belching thick black smoke, from Dowlais to the Rhymney Valley.

The other great industry of South Wales, coalmining, was well represented in paintings, with depictions of dangerous methods of descent into mines (men in a small basket and boys hanging on to the lowering chains) and hazardous working conditions in the tunnels (called roadways), with very young children often being employed. There were even bilingual signs in the paintings of underground scenes.

Transportation was not neglected, with scenes of horse-drawn tram roads, the canals built to transport iron and coal and also the railways that supplanted the waterways, including the massive iron structure of the Crumlin Viaduct, the highest one in Britain throughout its working life.

The talk finished with scenes of unrest in South Wales; the Chartist uprising in 1839, which had the aim of gaining political rights for the working classes, and the Rebecca Riots of the 1840s over the introduction of toll roads (the Turnpike Trusts).

The History Group are already anticipating Brian’s next pre-Christmas offering!

Steve Monaghan