ST ALBANS SCHOOL OF ART: THE FIRST 75 YEARS by Sarah Keeling
A DAY IN THE LIFE OF ST ALBANS SCHOOL OF ART, VICTORIA STREET (1960s) by Rosalind Pearce
HUGH SPENDLOVE, CERAMICS DEPARTMENT (1960s-1980s) by Sarah Lee
THE SCHOOL OF ART, ST ALBANS: FOUNDATION COURSE PROGRAMME OF STUDY (1970-1), A DAY IN THE LIFE by Jonathan Hills
THE DEVELOPMENT OF ART THERAPY ST ALBANS SCHOOL OF ART (1971-1992), A PERSONAL ACCOUNT by John Evans, Art Therapy Head of Department
TIMELINE – a snapshot into the School’s history
TEN YEARS A LECTURER (1970s – 1980s) by Mike Adcock
“THE TIME THAT HISTORY FORGOT” – A MEMOIR by Steven Adams
ORIGINS AND LEGACY by Judy Glasman
AN INTRODUCTION
Elizabeth Murton
When studying art foundation, I remember looking out of the train window and experiencing a profound shift in how I saw the world. The beauty of landscapes, the form of a tree, compositions framed by the train window…
In this publication, we are capturing moments – and much like the view from a train – it is a snapshot of an ever-changing scene. The junctions of people’s journeys in their own words, spanning everyday memories from staff and students, to the impact and legacy of the School on lives and careers.
The impetus for this project was to capture the history of St Albans School of Art, and what better way than with those who can remember. We wanted former students and staff to have agency in their story – to record and contribute as much or as little as they wished, in any form, including collaborating on their own research.
This is a glimpse of the unique experiences of those who have shared their ‘living memories’ of the School, with short texts capturing different perspectives, photographs, memorabilia, a timeline and imagery giving the context and history of the School. There is so much more to capture and explore but we hope that, through this publication, we have contributed to recording the signi cance of the School for history. This project would not
University of Hertfordshire archives
have been possible without the generosity of collaborators, participants and supporters: the Impact Accelerator Award funded by the Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC).
To set the scene, the rst origins of the St Albans School of Art were at a meeting in St Albans Town Hall in 1875, now St Albans Museum + Gallery, where it was decided that lessons in art and science should be offered. This evolved into a purpose-built base at Victoria Street in 1882 (initially shared with the library). In the 117 years to 1992 when it became part of what is now the School of Creative Arts, University of Hertfordshire, St Albans School of Art had six name changes and six Principals.
As with tracking any history, what happened to the School captures the greater context of what was happening at the time, including wider changes in national and local education policy; which then in uenced the courses, structures and opportunities. Within that context, are people and teams that work together to create and innovate – such as those responsible for the rst accredited Art Therapy course and the rst accredited part-time Fine Art course, providing unique and relevant ways for people to study. Alongside this was a commitment to part-time and exible learning throughout the School’s history – a founding aim of the School in 1875.
The legacy of this project will inform an exhibition at St Albans Museum + Gallery in 2025, to mark 150 years since inception. Oral histories and other contributions will remain accessible for research and interested parties via the University’s Heritage Hub.
Elizabeth Murton Curator, UH Arts + Culture
August 2024
University of Hertfordshire archives
UH Art Collection
Principal, 1955-1967
MARY HOAD, WAREHAM DORSET
Courtesy of St Albans Museums
Lecturer, Director of Introductory Course
MAURICE FEILD, STUDENTS AT THE ST ALBANS SCHOOL OF ART,1957
ST ALBANS SCHOOL OF ART: THE FIRST 75 YEARS
Sarah Keeling
“A liberal education for the cultivation of the power of observation, appreciation and knowledge of art.”
On the 17 April 1875, the new Committee of Science and Art Classes met in St Albans Town Hall to discuss setting up a new school. The Herts Advertiser reported that:
“The Magistrates, in Quarter Session, had granted [the secretaries] on behalf of the committee for the use of two rooms in the Town Hall, and the rooms were at their disposal when they liked to use them.”
They appointed Dr Puckett to be the rst Head of School which would open the rst week in May 1875 and run classes on Wednesday and Saturday for three terms a year. Although the School started small, with the promise of seven or eight students, it was clear that the committee always planned something larger with one member, Mr Price reported as saying:
“It is of no use to hesitate. If you show any timidity by trying to feel your way before you do anything, others will be timid. You must
be prepared to launch off unconditionally into the deep water, or you will never do anything.”
Dr R. Campbell Puckett had formerly been the Headmaster of the Leeds School of Art and under his leadership the classes ourished. Only three years later, in 1878, plans were already in place to build a new Public Library with space to house a School of Science and Art on Victoria Street.
The Victoria Street site, with its terracotta roundels of Humphry Davy, William Hogarth, and Francis Bacon, was designed by W.H. Syme and nanced by public subscription. It was formally opened in 1882 with a library on the ground oor and the rst oor dedicated to two large art rooms and two science classrooms.
From the start the classes given at the School of Science and Art were carefully managed and overseen by the St Albans Higher Education Sub-Committee. In 1903 a report given to this committee listed the classes taking place.
•Drawing Geometrical, Freehand, Blackboard, Model Drawing in Light and Shade, and Linear Perspective
•Design Principles and History of Ornament, Design applied to Decorative and Industrial Art
•Painting in Oils and Water Colors [sic] from Still Life, Flowers, etc.
•Study of the Figure Drawing and Painting from the Antique, Artistic Anatomy
“which on the whole, are well attended. There is also a Life Class for study of the Head and Draped Figure.”
There was also an annual competition, the Annesley Exhibition, with a prize of two years free tuition at the School.
In the early 1900s the School, like many art
schools across the country, had a focus on providing an art education for students who might need to use it within their profession. In 1911, a report showed that around 20% of the students worked in an occupation directly impacted by their art studies. Another 35% were Elementary School and Private School Teachers, and the rest were mainly private students. The students entered annual Board of Education examinations and could also submit their work to the Royal College of Art in South Kensington – in 1905, 19 works were submitted and ve were accepted.
In 1906, the School was renamed as the School of Art and Craft. Over the next ten years it took over, and adapted, the whole of the Victoria Street building allowing new classes such as Modelling, Woodcarving, Metal Work and Printing to be added to the curriculum.
Throughout the rst half of its life, the School of Art existed under several names and with many different teachers and students, but its aims remained the same. To provide training to students wanting to work in Commercial and Industrial Art, to train quali ed teachers to give instruction in art and, more generally, to support students “as part of a liberal education for the cultivation of the power of observation, appreciation and knowledge of Art.”
Courses existed for printers, photographers, surface designers, painters & decorators, embroiderers, illustrators, carvers, jewellers, illuminators, and architects. There was even a special class on drawing and letter design for shop assistants.
These courses continued into the early 1960s when the School began to focus more on the ne arts and, in 1965, the Secretary of State for Education and Science approved the building of a new School on Hat eld Road for the next stage in the life of the St Albans School of Art.
Sarah Keeling Curator of Collections
(Post Medieval to Contemporary)
St Albans Museums
August 2024
VICTORIA STREET SITE, AS IT IS TODAY Courtesy of Victoria Leighton
MAP OF SCHOOL OF ART SITES, FROM SCHOOL OF ART PROSPECTUS 1969-1970
Courtesy of Hugh Spendlove’s family
HATFIELD ROAD SITE University of Hertfordshire archives
A DAY IN THE LIFE OF ST ALBANS
SCHOOL
OF ART, VICTORIA STREET (1960s)
Rosalind Pearce
Remembering back to being at St Albans School of Art, in the latter part of the 1960s, on the Foundation Course, my mind takes me into the Life Studio.
On this particular day, we had a writer as a model. He posed on a platform in the middle of the class, with different levels. During our break a fellow student and I sat either side of him, chatting on the subject of his being a writer, with no self-consciousness whatsoever. If anyone was having dif culty with their drawing, we fellow students would assist them, drawing, as the tutor would at times, alongside the student's own effort. I remember when we painted the life model, my having done so of Ian Wright, I still have that painting in my portfolio. We had on one occasion, Quentin Crisp as a model. In conversation he said he felt Frank Sinatra should never have divorced Mia Farrow, and that she was a lovely girl.
The life class I remember as being in the morning. In the afternoon we would have photography; this was in a side studio. I recall developing some photographs creating a silvery effect, by holding objects above the paper whilst the light would be turned on for a fraction of a moment. At times we would take our loaned cameras walking around St Albans.
On one occasion I chose to photograph some empty bottles that had been left outside a gate, apparently for collection. Another choice was to photograph a circular signpost,
as though it were superimposed, on the oret of the Abbey tower.
In the afternoons we would also watch lms in a small studio located in the front of the building, on the left-hand side. I recall a lm on Charlie Chaplin, where he did his stunts with his legs and walking stick, spinning around in his baggy trousers in a silent movie with music. I remember the tutor saying that there were many people who ‘took off’ Charlie Chaplin, and sometimes fooling the audience I seem to remember. I remember questioning whether this was the actual Charlie. It certainly seemed so. No one could ‘skidaddle’ like him.
The library was in the front of the building (what is now a surgery), on the left-hand side when facing it. As well as art books, there were books on music and musicians. It was from reading about him there that I became interested in Rachmaninoff as a composer. Although Victoria Street is directly outside, I do not remember the traf c noise disturbing the peace of the library.
“We had on one occasion, Quentin Crisp as a model”
There was a sculpture room at the back of the building where we chose, I seem to remember, the medium to work with. I chose at one time wood and another time clay and decided to carve a buck (deer) out of the wood. I felt a bit like Michelangelo, sensing he was carving the creature already in the stone.
A painting room was upstairs at the back. We would, at breaks, sometimes go out onto the re escape and smoke Disque Bleu cigarettes. Sometimes the students would smoke in the room, with containers of turpentine around as well as linseed oil.
It was interesting to learn about the St Albans Abbey while at the School of Art and we were told that the Christians had built it on the Pagans worshipping place and that they added re towers to the construction, so that the Pagans could continue to light their res in worshipping. One of the students at St Albans School of Art on the Diploma Course, I believe, was asked to paint and repair part of the works in the Cathedral.
So, I have learnt from this project on St Albans School of Art, that as it became eventually 'The School of Creative Arts' (at the University), I nd I studied Fine Art in virtually the same establishment. I received my Bachelor of Arts Certi cate in St Albans Cathedral along with the other students.
BA Fine Arts
Summer 2024
Rosalind Pearce (née Rigby)
Images Courtesy of Rosalind Pearce
“...it was like, I know this is exciting and interesting, but I've no idea what's going on, and that's important. I now understand how important that is. Education, and that you inspire students, and you stimulate students not by giving them stuff that's easy to digest, and not by talking down to them, but by going over their heads and asking them to reach up. And it felt like that. It was good.”
Jonathan McCree Foundation
(1982-83)
University of Hertfordshire archives
University of Hertfordshire archives
GROUP E, 1971-72
Courtesy of Hugh Spendlove’s family
IMAGE OF HUGH SPENDLOVE MAKING
Courtesy of Abi Spendlove
HUGH SPENDLOVE CERAMICS DEPARTMENT
(1960s – 1980s)
Sarah Lee
My father, Gerald Hugh Spendlove, joined the College in 1961. Hugh, as he liked to be known, was brought up in Chichester and then studied on a foundation course at Salisbury School of Art before progressing to the Central School of Art and Design to study ceramics and calligraphy in 1951. After quali cation and a short time teaching in London, he moved to Scarborough, teaching ceramics in the School of Art there. He then moved with his wife, Valerie, and three children, to St Albans.
Hugh’s time at the Art School began in Victoria Street, where he taught within and ran the Ceramics Department. He was well known for his wide-ranging interests and desire to encourage everyone to bene t from their courses, whether foundation, a full-time diploma or part-time evening classes. Hugh loved his work. I remember him spending long hours wedging clay and experimenting with glazes. The opening of a kiln after ring was always an exciting time and, as a child, the kilns looked enormous!
My father dedicated himself to creating a well-organised department as well as stimulating and high-quality lectures and tutorials in all aspects of design and the craft of ceramics. He drew or photographed many examples of ‘natural’ things: plants, wildlife, bones and rocks that then featured in his work. In the 1970s, he was active in the development of one of the early Art Therapy courses and later, in the 1980s, preparing the curriculum for the College to move towards recognition at degree level.
In addition to his college work, Hugh was involved in the creative life of St Albans and beyond, participating in exhibitions, organising trips for students and travelling himself to places that could provide interest and resources: for example, the china clay
and tin mines in Cornwall. He designed a calligraphic map of the city for the council, an illuminated scroll for the late Queen’s Silver Jubilee and many commissions in calligraphy and ceramics. Many of these re ected Dad’s strong Christian faith, for example, a large ceramic relief panel of the ‘Tree of Life’, installed over the door at Christ Church, on the New Greens Estate. Through his involvement with the ‘Society of Designer Craftsmen’ and the ‘Royal Society of Arts’, Hugh met and corresponded with artists from all over the world. On his retirement in 1988, he moved with my mother to Hampshire where he continued to work from a small studio in his back garden and enjoyed ongoing contact with many of his former colleagues and students.
Sarah Lee (née Spendlove)
Daughter of Hugh Spendlove
August 2024
THE SCHOOL OF ART, ST ALBANS: FOUNDATION COURSE PROGRAMME OF STUDY (1970-1971)
A DAY IN THE LIFE
Jonathan Hills
The broad outline of the course is provided by the prospectus:
“The aim of this one-year course is to train students in observation, creative work, analysis and technical control through the study of line, form, colour and space relationships in two and three dimensions. The effective use of drawing is implicit in these studies. Part of the function of this diverse and intensive course is to assess and advise students in respect of their suitability for application to DipAD and other courses. The programme and timetable are arranged in ‘Blocks’ and the course structure includes a comprehensive tutorial system. During each block period of three weeks, the students’ time is arranged as follows:
• Art History and General Studies 1 day
• Ceramics or Textiles 3 days
• Drawing, Complementary Studies and Museum Visits 3 days
• Graphic Design (including Printmaking & Photography) 3 days
• Painting 2 days
• Three-dimensional design 3 days — Plus evening sessions comprising lectures, classes and tutorials."
The 74 students on the course (M34, F40) were divided into six groups of 12 or 13. I was in Group B and my days usually followed this pattern. I would arrive around 8.45am having travelled by bus, bike or friend’s car from Welwyn Garden City. Registration was due by 9.00am and the Registrar, Norman Parkins, was strict on attendance and timekeeping. There was time to buy materials in the School
Shop (a materials grant of £13 had provided each student with the essentials including an ‘Imperial’ portfolio, sketchbook, paints and pencils). Having checked my locker, I joined friends for a coffee and cigarette in the canteen until classes began at 9.30am. The morning session ran till 12.30 with a midmorning coffee break.
The lunch break 12.30 to 1.30pm provided just enough time for a meal in the subsidised Refectory followed by a pint and game of darts in the ‘Cock’ over the road (students in the Public Bar, staff in the Saloon). The afternoon session – again with a tea-break halfway through – ran from 1.30 to 4.30pm.
The new Art College at 7 Hat eld Road had opened in September 1970, but at rst, evening lectures between 5.00 and 7.00pm were still held in the Old Fire Station Annexe, Victoria Street – only moving to the basement lecture theatre in the new building from New Year 1971; and indeed for a while, Ceramics and Photography were still held in the original Art College building in Victoria Street.
Among the various distinguished speakers invited to the evening lecture programme were the experimental novelist B.S. Johnson and green-haired textiles specialist Constance Howard. Other evening activities could include further life drawing classes, informal seminars at the Fishpool Street home of Tutor-Librarian Philip Pacey, or just staying late to prepare portfolios for application to our next colleges. Frequently, after a late evening’s work we would take advantage of St Albans’ many pubs – usually the ‘Cock’, the ‘Boot’ or the ‘Fighting Cocks’ but 10.30pm closing meant we could usually get back to our various homes around the county.
The programme of museum visits was much more wide-ranging than the title suggests and we made full use of our proximity
to London. The principal locations I remember visiting were the Hayward, Tate and National Galleries, the Courtauld Institute, the South Kensington Museums, the British Museum, the Imperial War Museum and the Ethnographical Museum in Burlington Gardens; we also went to St Paul’s Cathedral, the Old Bailey, London Docks and London Zoo.
Students would also make individual visits to DipAD Colleges prior to application but lack of funds and transport restricted our range. My grant was £95 per term supplemented by £2.50p per week from a Saturday job. I only managed to visit the Central School of Art & Design in London, Brighton Art College and the Fine Art Dept. at Reading University where I was eventually accepted for the B.A. (Hons) Course.
Finally, a word about the tutors, most of whom were practising artists in their own right. The most distinctive of these was Arnold van Praag (Head of Painting) who employed an expressionist style that owed a lot to Soutine, and Head of Printmaking John Brunsdon whose coloured landscape etchings were commercially very acceptable; Head of Photography Graham McCarter had taken advertising photographs for the homeless charity, Shelter, while Director of Foundation Studies David Cowie had a small landscape accepted for the 1971 RA Summer show.
However, neither personal style nor cutting-edge avant-gardism were paid much attention in the teaching programme. That could wait for the next level – for this Foundation Course the focus was to help each student assemble a portfolio of work that would get him or her accepted on to those DipAD or Degree courses.
Jonathan Hills
Foundation Student 1970-71 August 2024 Foundation Student 1970-71
Archive materials courtesy of Jonathan Hills.
THE DEVELOPMENT OF ART THERAPY ST ALBANS SCHOOL OF ART (1971 –1992)
A PERSONAL ACCOUNT
John Evans Art Therapy Head of Department (1973-1992)
St Albans Art School was founded in 1890 by public subscription to provide practical training to artists and craftsmen in the region.
In 1970 the College offered a respected Foundation course and a range of adult education extra mural courses, the higher education courses were closed after the Coldstream Committees rationalisation of art schools in the late 1960s. Anthony Harris, the Principal, was looking to establish new higher education courses and saw the need for a course to prepare artists for work in psychiatric institutions and gained approval for a three-year pilot course titled the Certi cate in Remedial Art. The aim was to socialise patients by giving them an opportunity to engage in the physical practice of art making, to give them a voice and means of personal expression.
Anthony Harris engaged the Consultant Psychiatrist at the local Cell Barnes hospital, Dr Elizabeth Green as a consultant and lecturer. She recognised the value of enabling
her patients to experience the bene ts of the physical and social activity of art. The other key staff were Edward Adamson and Peter Wey, a ne art lecturer at the College. The course was given full approval and funding beginning in 1973, a Senior Lecturer post in art and psychology was advertised and I was appointed in September 1973.
The course set out to prepare artists to work in NHS institutions, preparing patients for the move to the community. Its aim was to equip students with the knowledge and skills to be effective members of the clinical team. The curriculum included an introduction to current psychiatric practice, terminology and treatment, clinical psychology, personality theories and pathologies and the psychology of art and aesthetics. There was an emphasis on the students' own personal artistic development. It was a strength of the course that students had access to the College’s specialist ne art staff and professional facilities, including ceramics, sculpture, printmaking, and photography, in the new
purpose-built art school. A programme of placements using psychiatric settings where students could be monitored by resident art therapists was established.
It is important to note the part Edward Adamson played in the early development and approach of the course. Edward felt that patients were psychologically recovering, ‘healing' in his terms, by means of expressing themselves through art. The act of creating was what mattered. The artist or therapist should avoid analysis of the patients work, to quote Edward:
“The actual therapy is purely incidental. The important thing is the art! You see, it is therapeutic for patients to walk across the hospital grounds to get to the studio. If they're going to sit in a group of patients it is therapeutic. But the great thing is the actual art they are producing, that's the thing that is getting them better. The mere fact that they put their brush to paper and try and paint.”
Edward’s approach became the basis of the St Albans’ course in those early years.
It was a privilege to work with Edward, Dr Green and Peter Wey. In December 1973
Tony Harris established a new department to develop the course with a staf ng and materials budget and asked me to become Head of Department, a post I maintained until 1992. In 1975 I changed the course title to Art Therapy. After Edwards’ retirement, I employed practising art therapists to lead the student art therapy training workshops. The following staff were employed:
Felicity Weir, art therapist at Addenbrookes Hospital Cambridge; Caroline Case, an early student on the course; Patsy Nowell Hall; Joy Schaverien, Art Therapist who became MA course leader and whose recent writing is seminal on art psychotherapy; Diana Halliday was an important in uence for these staff with
her supervision groups: Tessa Dalley, also an early student; Colin Teasdale, Art Therapist, also an ex-student; Phillipa Brown and Janek Dubowski were our rst PhD students. Kim James was appointed senior lecturer. Other appointments included lecturers in anthropology Ragnar Johnson and Tim Beardsworth psychologist.
The aim was to establish the course and secure funding into the future by achieving recognition with the National Council for Academic Awards. At that time degrees in independent art schools were validated by the Council. Validation required the College to establish new academic structures, the Academic Board, the Board of Governors and examinations boards and the appointment of external examiners. The other criteria for validation was the theoretical justi cation for the course as a written course document and the experience and quali cations of the staff team and College's facilities.
The Council responded to our submission through its Science Registry, not its Art and Design registry, on the basis that the course was preparing students for work in the NHS. It was also unique for the Council to award a Postgraduate Diploma when there was no undergraduate degree. The full-time oneyear course was validated and the part-time options added later. Following on from the Art Therapy courses, the Postgraduate Diplomas in Dramatherapy with Sue Jennings (the rst course leader) and Postgraduate Diploma in Dance Movement therapy led by Helen Payne were approved. Dr Alida Gersie was course leader of the drama therapy after Dr Sue Jennings, she was supported by Phil Jones and Ditty Dokter.
Many staff and students became major contributors to the success of the course and the development of Art Therapy through their
published works on the theory and practice of arts therapy and went on to become courses leaders and Professors in universities in the UK and abroad.
These developments and the growth of student numbers meant the department became the largest graduate department in any of the major art schools in England. The development of the Dramatherapy course was important as it increased student numbers so that we became more than 50% Higher Education, and the responsibility of the Higher Education Funding Council. This meant a merger with the University became an option for the College governors in 1992. I was impressed with the quality of the students enrolled. As the rst full-time course of its kind at postgraduate level, we attracted students from across the world. The average age was 29, the majority were women. These were the pioneers of the arts therapies.
The Course Management
The dynamic of the course was often intense, especially in the media sessions and the students’ artwork in the studios challenging. The interaction of this more personal artistic exploration and the art therapy training workshops were at times emotional for students and staff. As a means of managing this I introduced a weekly staff supervision meeting run by an external Psychotherapist. All full and part-time staff, including myself, were expected to attend, issues concerning a student, staff relations, and College policy could be raised. This was a unique approach to management for an academic institution, but became key in maintaining good staff-student relations.
To complement the qualifying courses, we developed a number of part-time courses. The
annual International Summer Schools in the arts therapies were one-week programmes offering a choice of training groups run by practicing art therapists, and a keynote lecture from published therapists and psychiatrists. These programmes recruited well and allowed us to establish an extensive mailing list of interested people, many of whom used the summer schools as a taster before applying for the full-time courses.
From the beginning, the courses attracted international students. In 1986, my application to the EU programme for Innovation in Education was successful and we were awarded a three-year grant, approximately £750,000 in today’s money. This allowed us to offer scholarships for European students to study full time on the Postgraduate Diploma courses.
International Conferences
In 1990, we held the rst European Conference for Arts Therapy Education. The aim was to set out the raison d’etre of our training and professional development. We agreed with Dutch colleagues to form a consortium of Higher Education Institutions involved in Arts Therapy Training. In 1992, ECArTE was founded. I was privileged to be the rst chairperson. The founding members of the Consortium were Hogeschool Nijmegen, Holland; Homeschool Midden Netherland, Holland, University Rene Descartes, Paris; University of Munster, Germany; and St Albans as the newly merged Faculty of the University of Hertfordshire.
ECArTE continues to play a signi cant role in developing research in the practice and training of Arts Therapists. There are currently 31 Higher Universities in the consortium. In 1985 the then principal, Colin Hunt, appointed
me as Vice Principal. I continued to manage the art therapy department with art and drama therapy course leadership delegated to the specialist staff. The CNNA’s approval allowed us to add new undergraduate degrees such as the innovative part time Fine Art degree which I developed with Graham Boyd the Course Leader. This was the rst of its kind in the UK.
John Evans Art Therapy Head of Department, 1973-1992 August 2024
“...there was a general feeling of being very proud of the course because it was very pioneering and because of its reputation...we had a very well-resourced course with very high-calibre people”
Linda
Brown Art Therapy 1975-76
PETER PULOY-WEY, UNTITLED, 1965
UH Art Collection
Fine Art Lecturer, Senior Lecturer in Art Therapy Department 1960s-1990s
TIMELINE
A snapshot into the School's history
HEAD: DR. R CAMPBELL PUCKETT
Location: Town Hall
The Herts Advertiser and St Albans Times report that two rooms in the Town Hall will be used for art and science classes. Mr Price, a member of the committee, said ‘There was such a demand for Art in these days.’
28 August, St Albans becomes a City
Name: School of Science and Art
PRINCIPAL: ROBERT E. GROVES
In 1878 was meeting at the Town Hall that supported proposals to provide a public library to incorporate the School of Science and Art on Victoria Street (James Corbett, A History of St Albans, 2006)
John Chapple lays the cornerstone of the building.
Opening of the new public library (James Corbett, A History of St Albans, 2006)
New location: Victoria Street.
Painting, drawing and building crafts were taught on the rst oor, and library on the ground oor.
‘Conversazione’ events were held with music, prints of the history of the town, and refreshments and an eccentric lecture series (St Albans, A History, Mark Freeman, 2023)
Name: School of Science and Art, Technical Institute
Name: St Albans School of Art and Craft
By 1906, the School of Art needed the entire Victoria Street site and bought the building from the Town Council.
Robert E. Groves designs props for the City’s pageant – a popular event
The School ‘continues to do valuable work’ with growing capacity both in terms of staff and space (Herts Advertiser)
The Library moves across Victoria Street to the new Carnegie Library building (Herts Advertiser)
During the rst world war the School housed troops, and students created ‘Rolls of Honor’ war shrines (St Albans Life on the Home Front, 1914–1918, Eds. J Mein, A Wares, S Mann, 2016)
First full-time courses (Prospectus, 1966-7)
Name: St Albans School of Industrial Art
Name: St Albans School of Industrial Art and Technical Institute
PRINCIPAL: WILLIAM LISMORE
Name: St Albans School of Art (in 1966 ‘The’ was added)
PRINCIPAL: MARY HOAD
Coldstream Report on art education altered curriculum and awards for art and design higher education. In the curriculum this included the introduction of core art therapy and art history.
Mary Hoad on part-time courses, as School runs low on space, “We regard that part of our work as very important” – Herts Advertiser. These part-time courses were called ‘Extra Mural’ courses and had their own prospectuses.
Shirley Road Annexe Opens
PRINCIPAL: ANTHONY HARRIS
Quentin Crisp was a regular life model at the School (approx dates)
Hat eld Road site opens
‘... another year of remarkable success.’ As the acceptance rate for Foundation Course students to other colleges is 80%, compared to national average of 54.5% (Herts Advertiser)
1971 - 1973
1973 - 1992
1975 – 1992
Certi cate in Remedial Art is launched as a pilot course (the beginnings of the rst in Art Therapy), with full approval in 1973.
Name: Hertfordshire College of Art and Design
The School missed out on being selected to be a provider of higher awards in art and design.
Full Approval for Remedial Arts Granted
The St Albans Foundation Programme was housed in a new, purposebuilt School in St. Albans, 7 Hat eld Rd
PRINCIPAL: COLIN HUNT
Certi cate in the Remedial Art is renamed Diploma in Art Therapy
19th February - The Sex Pistols played their rst of cial gig at Hertfordshire College of Art and Design in St Albans
Annexe on London Road Opens
- 1989
The College gained accreditation from the CNAA for some awards.
Masters programme in Art Therapy validated by CNAA led by Kim James and Joy Schaverien.
Innovative part-time Fine Art degree developed
‘College Faces Space Crisis’ headline in Herts Advertiser, as College seeks new spaces to respond to demand in September.
Name: School of Art & Design
Hat eld Polytechnic becomes the University of Hertfordshire. Hertfordshire College of Art and Design merged with the University and became the School of Art and Design. In 1997 it became the Faculty of Art and Design. It is now known as the School of Creative Arts.
Please note, this timeline is informed from personal memories and multiple sources – and should be respected as such. Whilst the project team intend to map out an accurate timeline, this is not always possible.
University of Hertfordshire archives
University of Hertfordshire archives
Principal Lecturer in Painting and BA (Hons) Fine Art Course Leader, 1976-1993
GRAHAM BOYD, ZIMBABWE, 1988
UH Art Collection
TEN YEARS A LECTURER (1970s - 1980s)
Mike Adcock
I began working as a part-time art history lecturer at the Hertfordshire College of Art and Design in September 1976. I was 26 and it was my rst professional appointment. My job was to teach students on the one-year Introductory Course, intended for students either too young or insuf ciently quali ed to go straight on to the Foundation Course. I'd spent a couple of years as an art student myself, before studying for a degree in art history followed by a one-year teaching course. By then I'd decided I wanted to teach in an art college and luckily got the job in St Albans, initially for just one day a week. Alongside art, music had always been a main interest and from the start I was hoping I could bring that into my teaching, which I was able to do.
That rst year at the College, 1976-1977, was an exciting time personally and culturally. Punk was at its height (I wasn't a punk) and I'd missed by a few months an appearance by the Sex Pistols who played in the College refectory. It was the last year Quentin Crisp worked as a model at the College. In the morning, he would sit at a table in the refectory cutting out crosswords from the previous week's Times saved for him by Alex Davies, the
librarian. In that year's Foundation Course, there were at least two students who were to make an impact on the music world. One was John McKay who joined Siouxie and the Banshees, playing guitar on their in uential rst album The Scream. The other was John Maybury who became a noted lmmaker, working with Derek Jarman, directing the lm Love is the Devil about painter Francis Bacon and making two classic pop videos: the Pet Shop Boys' West End Girls and Sinéad O'Connor's Nothing Compares 2U
In my second year I took up a half-time salaried post and began also teaching on the Foundation Course. My job title was Lecturer in Complementary Studies and my responsibilities included giving lectures, seminars and essay tutorials. I also saw Foundation students in groups for music sessions during the autumn term. I'd become interested in free improvisation and, using the lecture theatre, decided to introduce students to the idea.
Using bits of wood, metal or other material I'd sent them off to nd, we would create improvised ensemble junk pieces together. I found the best results came through switching off the lights, putting the room into total blackout, and the piece ending when I switched the lights on again. I saw this as an opportunity
WITH PART-TIME FINE ART COURSE STUDENTS AND 3 TUTORS INCLUDING MIKE (CENTRE) Courtesy of Mike Adcock
for students to work creatively as a group, unlike their studio work, which was not generally collaborative. I like to think it proved to be an enriching experience for (just about) everybody involved. In the second term students could choose to do more performance work once a week, which gave them the opportunity to develop ideas.
I also began organising weekly late afternoon events in the lecture theatre, aimed at Foundation students but which could be attended by anybody in the College. These included screenings of documentary and feature lms, plus visits by a range of visual artists, performance artists, lmmakers and musicians talking about and presenting their work.
In the early 1980s the College went through a period of expansion, with the introduction of new courses and one of those was a part-time two-year ne art course aimed at mature students. By then my lectureship had become full-time and I became responsible for writing and teaching much of the art history element. After a couple of years or so the course was validated as a degree course and extended in length. I stayed at the College until the rst intake of ne art students had completed their degrees, but by that time I was feeling it was time to move on. I'd become more active with my musical pursuits and I'd formed a band called Accordions Go Crazy.
We were lucky enough to be offered a three album record deal by a German record company with the possibility of considerable touring in Europe and knowing that would be incompatible with a teaching commitment I decided to make a change and begin pursuing a professional career in music. This I've continued, combining composing
and playing music with teaching and writing. I'm currently in the process of completing a book, Music Stones – The Rediscovery of Ringing Rock which will be published in early 2025. And somehow that's brought me round full-circle as I think about sculptors listening to the sound of the chisel as they chip away bits of stone and wondering whether I should have got those students to bring back some lumps of rock for their improvisations in the dark.
Mike Adcock Musician
August 2024
FORMED WITH FOUNDATION STUDENTS
PLAYING IN ST ALBANS
Courtesy of Mike Adcock
“THE
TIME THAT HISTORY FORGOT” – A MEMOIR
Steven Adams
We are familiar enough with the big names of art history, blockbuster exhibitions and the antics of contemporary artists but there is much more to our past than rst meets the eye.
The past comprises many very different perspectives: there are histories, not one single history. They are often fragile, sometimes tucked away in forgotten archives and easily lost. No less fragile are our lived memories of the past. It is with these in mind that we turn our attention to the history of St Albans School of Art, one made here by ex-students and staff, historians and curators, co-created together as part of an Arts and Humanities Research Council Impact Accelerator Award on the premise that when it comes to history, we are much more than the sum of our individual parts.
Let’s start with a picture unearthed by staff at St Albans Museum of two students at work at St Albans Art School made by Maurice Feild in 1954. Feild’s painting shows the studio on the Victoria Road site, the School’s home between 1882 and 1961. One student draws in a sketchbook, the other works at an easel - possibly after a life-model. Feild’s use of carefully observed drawing and subdued patches of colour took its lead from the Euston Road School, a conservative movement opposed to modernist art that had its heyday in the 1920s
but still partly held sway in British art schools 30 years later. Observational drawing of this kind formed the foundation of many disciplines in art and design. Its importance features prominently in the Sir William Coldstream’s 1960 government commissioned Coldstream Report on art education, one that shaped the British Art School curriculum for a generation. If much of St Alban’s curriculum looked a little staid, the ‘Complementary Studies’ programme functioned as a testbed for more radical forms of practice. Today, staff and students re ect in detail about what we teach and how students learn. Back then, one ex-student remembers, lecturers ‘could turn up and do whatever [they] wanted’. At St Albans, for example, the performance artist Paul Burwell lectured on the philosophy of Karl Marx while chopping onions, and John Maybury – latterly of Siouxee and the Banshees – performed with a chainsaw. Events such as these were inspired by the 1980s vogue for experimental lm and performance art. Some years ago, a senior academic from the Far East visited the university, her mission to nd out how to make her fashion students’ work ‘more edgy’. Her students had excellent technical stills and a clear vocational commitment, but they were missing the experimentation and radical thinking written deep within the DNA of British Art Schools. Quite how this missing ingredient might be captured was hard to say. Could it be taught? Rather, it resided in a liberal education in a liberal democracy, the unbridled license encouraged in students, their own vaunting ambition in a country riven by con ict - the Oil Crisis, the Three-Day Week, the Miners’ Strike, Punk - but also an optimism predicated on the value of informed dissent.
The gap between past and present is significant in other ways. When in the 1990s, art education became part of a university curriculum
we were required to think more carefully about the exact premises on which art education was based: how we make judgements about art and design’s content and quality. Art became part of the Academy (as it once had been in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries) and we spent the next three decades arguing about exactly of what it now comprised. Back then, artists and designers typically taught from a sense of ‘personal creative and intellectual conviction’ and set themselves against academic prescription. Art at its best was about nothing other than its own formal character and de ed academic analysis. Not surprisingly, our research showed that many ex-students found it ‘hard to keep up’ in what from today’s vantage point looks like a pedagogy-free zone. Notwithstanding, the expectations on our students were inordinately high. Many recall how ‘crits’ – a chance to discuss work with fellow students, staff, visiting designers, artists and critics, (one student remembers, Clement Greenberg, friend of Pollock, Rothko et al, and one of the 20th century’s most in uential critics) – took no prisoners. Often alarmingly abrasive, exchanges (often in nearby pubs) took place not among teachers and students, but a community with a lifelong commitment to their disciplines. Ex-students re ect that the discipline instilled in them in those early years lasted a lifetime.
It is impossible to trawl through these memories without feeling a certain nostalgia. Back then higher education was free or inexpensive, staff-student ratios were low, and post-industrial decline made studio space available at peppercorn rents. Canteen staff at St Albans made slices of ‘bread pudding that would fell a police horse’, ‘cheered up’ the one vegetarian option available in the canteen with chicken stock, and each Friday got tipsy on wine that was ‘a shame to waste’. And all this against the
backdrop of the School’s then Principal picking out an Étude by Debussy on the baby grand, while Sid Vicious did something unspeakable in the corner of the refectory. Bohemians of the last 200 years would have recognised the scene. We should pause for a moment. Back then, the celebration of diversity that was never really part of art school radicalism, now forms a cornerstone of university life. We performed our radicality rather than put it into practice. Our research also shows instances of misogyny that now stop us in our tracks. And unlike today, there were remarkably few people of colour comprising the staff and student body. In the late 1990s, the government assessed the value of the arts in terms of their nancial value to the creative economy and found them an enormous nancial asset. As the YBAs [Young British Artists] showed us, art school Bohemia could be monetized. When quizzed on art and design’s value, Anglo-Saxon culture often gets uncomfortable. Money, jobs, the economy form part of the answer but there’s more. What of the fate of art’s role in a world driven by geo-political upheaval, the rise of the far right, climate emergency and more? This memoir is an opening shot, the rst sketch in preparation for a publication by us all that might help give something of an answer.
Steven Adams
Associate Dean for Research School of Creative Arts
Former visiting lecturer at St Albans between 1988 and 1992
RESEARCH IMAGE CREATED BY MANDY NEWMAN AS PART OF THE LIVING MEMORIES PROJECT Student, BA (Hons) Fine Art And Design (1987-1991)
DIANE MACLEAN, MOUNTAIN, 2005
UH Art Collection
Student (1980-85)
“there was a lot of collaboration just engaging in each other’s work”
Nicolas Roope Foundation (1988-89)
ORIGINS AND LEGACY
Judy Glasman
al occupations on which their studies have a direct bearing; 35% are teachers who attend to improve their draughtsmanship; the remainder study art as part of a general education.
My head is spinning with memories and history, with the many phases of the School of Art from School of Art and Science; Art and Craft and Industrial Art; School of Art and Design; Faculty of Creative and Cultural Industries, and nally, School of Creative Arts. It’s a picture of constant change, fueled by optimism, hard work and coffee.
In 1995 [when part of the new University of Hertfordshire] we were housed in the drawing building at De Havilland, which had an abandoned glamour, guard dogs and undulating parquet oors which had succumbed to the damp. 2,000 packing cases, 100 lorry loads of equipment, 35,000 books and 70,000 slides came from St Albans. One day I was on the phone while WW2 planes dived outside my window and had to explain that Spielberg was lming on the air eld outside. Colin Hunt, Principal, had a grand piano in his of ce and played Chopin during lunch.
HCAD [the predecessor in St Albans, Hertfordshire College of Art and Design] had its origins in the movement to improve the arts triggered by the 1851 exhibition, Cole and Prince Albert. Portraits of Frances Bacon, Humphrey Davy and William Hogarth decorated the front of the 1880s School, a great municipal achievement. In 1911 HMI reported that 20% of students are engaged in industri-
By the 1930s advertising, etching, carving, printing, architectural drawing, embroidery and women’s craft were taught. In the 1960s however, progress in teaching higher education was stymied after the Coldstream report, with St Albans excluded from higher education, although this was picked up by Colin Hunt under the new CNAA validations. In 1992, HCAD had 106 part-time Fine Art degree students, 207 BA Art and Design, Postgraduate Arts Therapies had 153 and 349 were on Foundation. Extra-mural classes ourished with 382 people and 350 doing other short courses.
Many strands and attitudes from HCAD were deep in our inherited DNA [at the University], con rmed in conversation with Anthony Harris (Tony) and at a celebratory tea with Colin and his contemporaries. Tony claimed that he had bought the rst Italian Gaggia machine in St Albans and that this facilitated his lobbying of local councillors who visited to sample the coffee and were buttered up. He was constantly extending Victoria Street and his ideas on art education determined the new purpose-designed Hat eld Road building, which was seen as a model modern art school. He said, ‘I changed the name to Hertfordshire College of Art and Design….in fact all of our students came from all over the county – it was a very strong county thing.’
The genetic strands of HCAD were the strong civic connections and an outward-facing approach; the community of practitioners; skills teaching; partnership of education and industry; teaching of art history and the postgraduate ethos of arts therapies with its international connections. These neatly coincided with the trajectory of the University.
The School did not quite advocate Anarchy in the UK, although it did host the Sex Pistols in the Student Union. The most deliberately disruptive part of HCAD was probably the Foundation, the jewel in the crown of the courses and it continued to be a hothouse for experimentation and experiential learning. This extra year was unique in education and led to the claim that ‘we do things differently’.
Arts Therapies within an art school, using the studio and arts processes for client development and therapeutic interactions, was a specialty of which I was also very proud.
Tony told me ‘it’s never been recognised that I invented this art therapy in Europe, you know… It was the rst ever (course), and it took me 3 years with the Ministry of Health’ and the Ministry of Education. He was pivotal in setting up the course and the education network. Due to professional recognition issues the course had to be called Remedial Art (Art Therapy). He brought in the key gure of Edward Adamson ‘the father of art therapy’. ‘Our strength was that for every art person, there was a medically trained person.’
Tony had been brought in to build up art history and the library amongst other matters. Using his connections, the prestigious public lecture programme of recognised names was devised each year. This latter activity was transferred and had a loyal St Albans audience travelling to Hat eld each week along with 600-800 people on workshop short courses. We continued the habit of end of year graduate shows which were large scale affairs. We had made our mark on the University, Colin chuckled, recalling the time the A1 motorway was brought to a standstill on opening night.
After Colin retired, he was replaced by Chris McIntyre. The Law School moved into the building in St Albans and the Margaret Harvey Gallery was established, eventually leading to
the creation of UH Arts [now UH Arts + Culture], to support various art forms for students and the public.
The St Albans experience of civic engagement and industry links would provide a basis for expansion of the employability agenda, plugging us into what became known as the Creative and Cultural Industries. Examples of this were the Beales Hotel project in Hat eld for Andrew Beale who was particularly chuffed as he was a descendant of Mary Beale, one of Britain’s rst professional female artists from the 1600s, and working with Andy Goldsworthy for Midsummer Snowballs at the Barbican, with 2m diameter snowballs placed around the City of London. We worked with Warner Bros, an employer of our model design students, and with the animation and games industry in London. We had partnerships in Moscow, Kuala Lumpur and Sao Paolo.
Although the cosiness and separate identity of HCAD disappeared into the blockbuster activities of the University, Chris McIntyre’s tagline for our work was that we were ‘a hybrid of the best of the School of Art combined with the University Faculty’. The social life from St Albans was re-established in the gallery café in the Art and Design building which was acknowledged to have the best coffee on College Lane campus.
Judy
Glasman Fellow of the University of Hertfordshire, Dean of School of Creative Arts 2012 - 2018
August 2024
Lecturer, 1988 - 2012
PETER ARNOLD, STILL LIFE II
UH Art Collection
Lecturer, 1988 - 2012
PETER ARNOLD, STILL LIFE I
UH Art Collection
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
Oral History contributors
•Mike Adcock
• Jean Atkinson
•Linda Brown
•Peter Buck
• Briony Buck
• Jonathan Hills
•Jonathan McCree
•Tudor Morgan-Jones
•Mandy Newman
•Nick Pettit
•Nicolas Roope
•Patricia Simpson
•Katy Schutte (facilitator)
•Ray Whyard
+ previous oral history contributors
care of the St Albans Museum + Gallery
+ future oral history contributors
Publication contributors
•Steven Adams
• Mike Adcock
•Linda Brown
• Angela Edmonds
•John Evans
•Judy Glasman
•Jonathan Hills
• Sarah Keeling
•Sarah Lee (née Spendlove)
•Jonathan McCree
• Elizabeth Murton
•Mandy Newman
• Rosalind Pearce
• Nick Pettit
•Nicolas Roope
• Abi Spendlove
Artist works from UH Art Collection
•Peter Arnold
•Graham Boyd
•Mary Hoad
• Diane Maclean
•Peter Puloy-Wey
Artwork from St Albans Museums
•Maurice Feild
University Staff past and present
•Chris McIntyre
•Gary Nash
•Michael Wright
Organisations
•IAA team
•St Albans Museum + Gallery team
•St Albans Library
•UH Arts + Culture team
•Hertfordshire County Council Archives
•Heritage Hub
Publication Team, UH Arts + Culture
• Elizabeth Murton
• Laura Rolinson
Publication Design
• Nick Lovegrove
A huge thank you to all of those who have made this project possible through their commitment and dedication to capturing this important art school and the personal histories which entwined with it. Including those who attended sessions, contributed to the publication and supported the project in any way.
In memory of all those who are no longer with us.
Please note, this is a collection of personal memories and experiences – and should be respected as such. Subjectivity enables a richer tapestry of history. In some cases, different voices in this publication share their experiences of the same histories from different perspectives. Please note, whilst the project team intend to map out an accurate timeline, this is not always possible.
This project is funded by the Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC), part of UK Research and Innovation, through an award from the University of Hertfordshire’s AHRC Impact Acceleration Account.
Protocol number: cCTA/SF/UH/06122
Approving committee: University of Hertfordshire Social Sciences, Arts and Humanities Ethics Committee with Delegated Authority
September 2024
“Up to that point, it was the best time in my life, opening the door to the world of art and design.”
Nick Pettit Foundation (1983-84)
IMAGE OF STUDENT WORK Courtesy of Hugh Spendlove's family
