Musicians and Graces - Wigmore Street, London, UK
N 51° 31.002 W 000° 08.768
30U E 698003 N 5711147
These reliefs are on a building on the south east side of Wigmore Street at the junction with Cavendish Square. The reliefs are only on the Wigmore Street elevation.
Waymark Code: WMKTFK
Location: London, United Kingdom
Date Posted: 05/28/2014
Views: 2
All the reliefs are at ground floor level but there are three panels at first floor level that may have carried other reliefs, building name or simply were prepared for reliefs but never used.
In addition to the four main reliefs, there is decorative work along the top of the first floor and fourteen relief columns. Either side of the door and at the extreme left of the building are relief carvings of graces that are about true life-size. The most interesting releif is at the top of the panel between the two graces to the left.
This shows a series of eleven cherubic-like figures playing musical instruments. The central figure is playing a piano with the other characters playing a variety of stringed, wind and percussion instruments.
Research shows that the reliefs were probably placed here when Binsmeads used the premises as a piano shop.
The Ornamental Passions website tells us:
For years I have secretly loved this putti orchestra, and felt ashamed. It is everything that modern art critics despise - representational, cutesy and the worst sort of fake - a 20th century pastiche of the Georgian style.
But now I find that it is by Art Deco hero Gilbert Bayes, so it's OK to admire it!
The second surprise is that Bayes used his usual concrete and not the stucco that I had assumed, though they are covered in so many layers of paint it is impossible to see.
It seems that the orchestra and the pair of ladies on either side of the door date from 1925 when John Brinsmead & Co, the piano makers, converted it into a showroom. Brinsmead had gone bust in 1920 after the workers went on strike and had been bought by rivals Cramer, who clearly wanted to make what had been the side of the house into something grander.
They are unusual for Bayes. Did he do them under the influence of Rex Whistler, who was just beginning to make waves at the time, or for a bit of fun, or because he needed the money?