Strawberry Hill, London
The inventor of modern gothic returns to haunt the spooky house he built in a revealing exhibition of masterpieces and grim curiosities
Horace Walpole was an aesthetic rebel against convention a century ahead of Oscar Wilde. He built himself Strawberry Hill, a house that aped the “barbaric” middle ages, then, while daydreaming among its pointy arches, fan vaulting and spooky niches, got the idea for The Castle of Otranto, the first modern work of horror fiction, which still influences every haunted-house story. As the inventor of modern gothic he is a giant of modern culture. Now he has returned to haunt the house he built.
The custodians of Walpole’s seismic home have brought back, from collections all over the world, the paintings, sculptures and surreal objects that originally decorated it and were sadly dispersed after his death. Installed for a few months in their original locations in his house, Walpole’s masterpieces and curiosities paint a picture not just of Strawberry Hill in its original splendour but the strange and fertile mind that created it.
Continue reading...from Property | The Guardian https://ift.tt/2NO6nDs
via IFTTT
No comments:
Post a Comment