The 10 th Duke, who wisely decided that schoolgirls would make better tenants than soldiers, arranged for Chatsworth to be occupied by Penrhos College but, pessimistic about the future of huge houses, never moved back in once they’d left.
Reproduced by permission of Chatsworth Settlement Trustees / Bridgeman ImagesĪnd then the 20 th century arrived, with new tax schemes, and two world wars. Lucian Freud, Woman in a White Shirt (Deborah Cavendish, Duchess of Devonshire (1920-2014)), 1958-1961 The Devonshire Collections, Chatsworth © The Lucian Freud Archive.
It’s also a masterclass in the subtle art of generational decorative overlay. Entitled Living With Art We Love, the whole is one of the most staggeringly beautiful exhibitions of the year, with, at its centre, a collection of seldom-seen paintings and drawings by Lucian Freud. Boulle desks, exceptional for the exquisite marquetry that made the furniture designer such a favourite of Louis XIV, host colourful assortments of shapes by the Australian artist Pippin Drysdale that glow in the sunlight like cabochon-cut stones. Inside, enormous canvases by modern and contemporary artists such as Sean Scully, Howard Hodgkin and Endellion Lycett-Green line the corridors, delicate collections of work by Edmund de Waal rest on marble mantlepieces, while a new dinner service designed by Michael Craig-Martin and made by Royal Crown Derby is laid on the dining room table.
Modern living art series#
The first clue comes on approach scattered across the Capability Brown-designed landscape are a series of odd-looking assemblages, from a World War II military jet that appears to have nosedived into the ground and blossomed into a flower, to a vast, articulated aluminium model of Pegasus that looks as though it might take off at any moment. Repeat visitors to Chatsworth in Derbyshire, famously one of the finest country houses in Britain and seat of the Duke of Devonshire, will notice changes when they return, the house having reopened for the season this week.
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