Massey Sisters

Last updated • 1 min readFrom Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia

Edith Ellen Henrietta Massey (1863–1946) and Gwenddolen Elizabeth Evileen Massey (1864–1960), known as the Massey Sisters, were two Welsh artists and botanists who created a unique record of the plant-life of Anglesey in the late 19th and early 20th century.

Contents

Life and career

Edith and Gwenddolen Massey were born on the island of Anglesey, off the coast of North Wales. They lived at Cornelyn Manor, near Llangoed, a country house built in 1861 by their father William Massey (1817–1897), who was Deputy Lieutenant and later High Sheriff of Anglesey (1864).

Historian John Smith has written that the sisters had a "remarkable" talent for making detailed and exceptional botanical studies despite the fact that it appears they had little training. Edith gathered the flower and plant specimens while her younger sister Gwenddolen painted them in watercolours. They are known to have painted more than 500 studies, annotated with the species names in Welsh, English and Latin. Gwenddolen died aged 96 in October 1960 and is buried with her sister and family at St Seiriol's Church, Penmon. [1]

Neither sister married or had children and their estate was inherited by their nearest surviving relative Sybil Mary, whose mother was a niece to the Massey Sisters' mother. After Mary's death, the collection of watercolour paintings was bought at auction by Anglesey Borough Council for £2,000 in 1982. Together with the previously acquired collection of works of Charles Tunnicliffe, this formed the start of the island's museum service, according to John Smith. [2]

Reception

The sisters' paintings are held by Oriel Ynys Môn in Llangefni, where a selection of them are on permanent display. [3]

In 2010, the University of Cardiff funded a five-year research project led by author Tristan Hughes to promote knowledge of the Massey sisters to the wider public and to place their work in its historical context. [4]

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Holy Island, Anglesey</span> Island, part of Wales, United Kingdom

Holy Island is an island on the western side of the larger Isle of Anglesey, Wales, from which it is separated by the Cymyran Strait. It is called "Holy" because of the high concentration of standing stones, burial chambers and other religious sites on the small island. The alternative English name of the island is Holyhead Island. According to the 2011 UK Census, the population was 13,659, of whom 11,431 (84%) lived in the largest town, Holyhead.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Llangefni</span> County town of Anglesey, Wales

Llangefni is the county town of Anglesey in Wales. At the 2011 census, Llangefni's population was 5,116, making it the second-largest town in the county and the largest on the island. The community includes the village of Rhosmeirch.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Charles Tunnicliffe</span> British naturalistic painter

Charles Frederick Tunnicliffe, OBE, RA was an internationally renowned naturalistic painter of British birds and other wildlife. He spent most of his working life on the Isle of Anglesey. He is popularly known for his illustrations for the novel Tarka the Otter.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Kyffin Williams</span> Welsh painter

Sir John Kyffin Williams, was a Welsh landscape painter who lived at Pwllfanogl, Llanfairpwll, on the Island of Anglesey. Williams is widely regarded as the defining artist of Wales during the 20th century.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Llangoed</span> Village and community in Anglesey, Wales

Llangoed is a small village, community and electoral ward just north of Beaumaris, on the Isle of Anglesey, at grid reference SH609793. The Royal Mail postcode begins LL58. Llangoed ward has a population of 1,275 (2001), falling at the 2011 census to 1,229.

Dulas Bay is a small bay on the north east coast of Anglesey, north Wales, forming the boundary between Llaneilian and Moelfre communities. The bay is bordered by three beaches.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">D. Ben Rees</span> Welsh historian (born 1937)

David Benjamin Rees is a Welsh and English-language publisher, author, lecturer and minister in the Presbyterian Church of Wales since 1962. He is a leader of the Welsh community in Liverpool, and heads one of the city's five remaining Welsh chapels. His small publishing house, Modern Welsh Publications Ltd, was established in 1963 and from 1963 to 1968 it operated from Abercynon in the Cynon Valley of South Wales. Since 1968 it has operated from Allerton, Liverpool and is the only Welsh language publishing house still operating in the city of Liverpool.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Malltraeth</span> Village in Anglesey, Wales

Malltraeth is a small village in the southwest of Anglesey, in the community of Bodorgan. It is now at the end of a large bay, which used to extend much further inland, almost creating a second sea strait in the area. The population as of the 2011 census was only 255.

This article is about the particular significance of the year 1805 to Wales and its people.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Llanfaes</span> Village in Anglesey, Wales

Llanfaes is a small village on the island of Anglesey, Wales, located on the shore of the eastern entrance to the Menai Strait, the tidal waterway separating Anglesey from the north Wales coast. Its natural harbour made it an important medieval port and it was briefly the capital of the kingdom of Gwynedd. Following Prince Madoc's Rebellion, Edward I removed the Welsh population from the town and rebuilt the port a mile to the south at Beaumaris. It is in the community of Beaumaris.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Anglesey</span> Island county in Wales

Anglesey is an island off the north-west coast of Wales. It forms the bulk of the county known as the Isle of Anglesey, which also includes Holy Island and some islets and skerries. The county borders Gwynedd across the Menai Strait to the southeast, and is otherwise surrounded by the Irish Sea. Holyhead is the largest town, and the administrative centre is Llangefni. The county is part of the preserved county of Gwynedd.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Martyn Jones (painter)</span> British contemporary painter (born 1955)

Martyn Jones is a British contemporary painter who works from his studio in Cardiff, Wales.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Welsh art</span> Art produced in Wales or by Welsh people

Welsh art is the traditions in the visual arts associated with Wales and its people. Most art found in, or connected with, Wales is essentially a regional variant of the forms and styles of the rest of the British Isles, a very different situation from that of Welsh literature. The term Art in Wales is often used in the absence of a clear sense of what "Welsh art" is, and to include the very large body of work, especially in landscape art, produced by non-Welsh artists in Wales since the later 18th century.

William Roos was a Welsh artist and engraver. Several of Roos' portraits, mainly of notable Welsh figures, are owned by the National Library of Wales.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Rhun ap Iorwerth</span> Welsh journalist and politician

Rhun ap Iorwerth is a Welsh journalist and politician who has served as the Leader of Plaid Cymru since June 2023. He has been the Member of the Senedd (MS) for Ynys Môn since 2013.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">St Gwenfaen's Well</span> Holy well in Anglesey, Wales

St Gwenfaen's Well is an early medieval holy well in the south west of Holy Island, Anglesey, named after St Gwenfaen, whose cloister was nearby. The site includes substantial remains of a building and is both a scheduled monument and a Grade II listed building. Traditionally, a gift of two white quartz pebbles thrown into the pool can cure mental health problems.

Wil Jones was a Welsh portrait artist, guitarist, and teacher. His portrait work has been exhibited around the United Kingdom, notably portraits of Eric Sykes and Norman Wisdom, and a collection of Welsh literary portraits on display at the National Library of Wales.

Gruffudd ap Maredudd ap Dafydd was a Welsh bard working in Anglesey in the service of the Tudors of Penmynydd. One of the last of the older school of poets known as the Gogynfeirdd, he resisted the innovations in Welsh verse-form which took place in his lifetime. About 2400 lines of his work have survived in the Red Book of Hergest. His best-known poem is "Gwenhwyfar", an elegy to a young lady. He was described by the literary historian D. Myrddin Lloyd as "the finest of all the late Gogynfeirdd poets" and by Saunders Lewis as "one of the greats".

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Llyn Cerrig Bach Plaque</span> Iron Age bronze plaque found in Wales

Llyn Cerrig Bach Plaque is a bronze plaque that dates from 200BC to AD100 in the Iron Age, found at Llyn Cerrig Bach.

References

  1. Smith, John (2014). It was the most beautiful day - Gwaith y Chwiorydd Massey. The Work of the Massey Sisters. Orial Ynys Mon. p. 3. ISBN   0 95 207 65 6X.
  2. Smith, John (2014). It was the most beautiful day - Gwaith y Chwiorydd Massey. The Work of the Massey Sisters. Oriel Ynys Mon. p. 16. ISBN   0 95 207 65 6X.
  3. "Collections: The Massey Sisters". orielmon.org.
  4. Hughes, Tristan. "Landscape, History and Creative Writing: The Massey Sisters". UK Innovation and Research.