Gunnersbury Park Museum Listings

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Exhibition at Gunnersbury Park Museum

Landscapes and Landmarks - Historical paintings of local scenes

As you sit in a queue of traffic at Hanger Lane or on the M4 it may be hard to imagine that Acton was once famous for its oak trees and Heston for its rolling fields of wheat. An exhibition at Gunnersbury Park Museum of paintings and prints made over the last two hundred years shows how much the landscape has changed.

Here are local landmarks which have now completely disappeared: the Market House at Brentford; the old house at Hanworth Park; the toll gate at Neal�s Corner in Hounslow; the playground of Great Ealing School and the original tower of St Mary�s Church; Steyne Mills, a wonderful Victorian building in Acton, which was to become the Empire Laundry and then the
Co-op jam factory, before being demolished in the 1960s.

Other pictures show familiar scenes, but looking very different. In 1837 the Wharncliffe Viaduct in Hanwell was brand new, a magnificent example of Brunel�s engineering and the first viaduct on the Great Western Railway. In1900 the Argyle Road in Ealing was barely more than a path through fields which stretched all the way to Harrow. In the 1970s the docks at Old Brentford were still thronged with cranes and ships serving thriving local industries.

Visitors are invited to bring in their own photographs of the same scenes as they are today. These can be copied and put on display beside the paintings to demonstrate the changes that have taken place.

These paintings and prints are just a sample from the museum�s large collections. They are on show from April 11 to September 29.

The museum is open every afternoon (weekdays 1pm �5pm, weekends 1pm � 6pm). Admission is free.

For further details please contact Vanda Foster
Tel: 020 8992 1612 email gp-museum@cip.org.uk

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