An Evening with the William Morris Society of Canada

                On Thursday, January 15^th 2015 a group of about 60 people gathered to listen to two wonderful talks hosted by the William Morris Society of Canada in the historic University College at the University of Toronto. The speakers for the evening, Robert Reason (curator at the Art Gallery of South Australia in Adelaide) and Martin Stott (chair of the William Morris Society in the UK) presented two geographically contrasting analyses of Morris, his work, and his influence.  

Robert Reason’s talk “William Morris Down Under” focused on people who connected William Morris and his work to Australia. The first two, Robert and Joanna Barr Smith were major clients of Morris. The most interesting picture shown in Reason’s talk is of the theatre designed by Ashbee and furnished with Morris& Co. goods in the Barr Smith’s home, Torrens Park. This theatre is a breath-taking sight and exudes grandeur. The large drawing room in Torrens Park is also a space of grandeur and was covered in St. James paper and contained a walnut bric-a-brac cabinet, amongst other Morris goods.  The Barr Smith’s summer house Auchendarroch in Mount Barker was also furnished by Morris. Reason states that the Barr Smith’s were such major clients that Morris also named pieces after them such as a small Barr carpet (1890) (seen here) and Australia table cover. The Barr Smith’s children also carried on their parents’ tradition by furnishing their homes with Morris as well.  Another Australian Morris connection given in Reason’s talk is George Brookman who commissioned a window for the Adelaide Stock Exchange in 1900 from William Morris &Co.  Seen here , this window also has the representation of Canada on the right panel.  Reason ended his wonderful informative talk by mentioning that many of these William Morris works are on permanent display at the Art Gallery of South Australia. Their website is http://www.artgallery.sa.gov.au/agsa/home

        In his talk “Morris’ Icelandic Journeys 1871 and 1873,” Martin Stott presented pictures and context to Morris’ trip to Iceland which Stott himself undertook with a group from the William Morris Society (UK) in 2013. During his trip to Iceland William Morris kept a journal which he eventually gave to Georgiana Burne-Jones for safe keeping, and Stott mentions that Morris was seen as a great travel writer (not that Morris needed yet another thing to excel at). Stott outlined the trip from Britain through the Faroe Islands to Iceland via a ferry which also served as a post boat. As Stott states it is a 24hr trip yet one that he quite enjoyed as he retraced the steps of William Morris. Stott presented photos of the first views that Morris would have seen as he arrived in Iceland. Morris would go on to record these views and feelings in his poem “Iceland First Seen.”  One of the most interesting pictures presented in Professor Stott’s talk was of a piece of performance art where a metal shed was covered in Morris wallpaper while inside “Omnibus” the 1967 film featuring Andrew Faulds as William Morris was projected. 

    Stott ended the evening by outlining the great work being done by William Morris Society (UK) and all Morris scholars should be excited for what they have planned for 2014 and 2015. The William Morris Society (UK) website is http://www.williammorrissociety.org/ which I encourage you to bookmark. It was a very insightful engaging evening which presented two aspects of the polymath William Morris and I look forward to the next talk hosted by the William Morris Society of Canada. The William Morris Society of Canada website is http://www.wmsc.ca/ and you can find them on Twitter @wmsc_ca