York St Mary's - Five Sisters Installation

York St Mary's serves as an exhibition space for which the York Museums Trust regularly commissions site-specific artworks. The medieval parish church was deconsecrated in 1958.

Today was my last full day in York, a chance to catch up on a few last details of fieldwork before sending myself back towards London tomorrow morning. I made sure to drop by York St Mary's during a lunch break to photograph their current installation: Five Sisters.

The exhibition caught my eye because it uses the same nickname given to the towering transept facade inside the city's cathedral, York Minster. The artists Emma Biggs and Matthew Collings drew on the aesthetics of these five lancets to create their composition in mosaic and canvas painting. At the Minster, these soaring fields of glass were not decorated with representations of stories or saints, instead a mostly monochromatic scheme of grisaille glass was used to create geometric arrangements.

The glass in the so-called "Five Sisters" windows at York Minster was probably installed around 1250.

A detail of the "Five Sisters" glass patterns (via Traditional Building). Thirteenth-century stained glass compositions generally limited the use of saturated fields of red and blue compared to earlier Gothic tastes. Lighter colors and clearer glass admitted more light.

The mosaic along the nave of the church uses local fragments of pottery from the thirteenth and fourteenth century for tesserae. The homage to the Middle Ages becomes explicit, and the reuse of these shards calls attention to how succeeding generations treat objects of the past. These potsherds come from the York Museums Trust, and I assume that their collection has a surfeit of such remnants. Most preservation institutions are awash with historical bric-a-brac, only a small fraction of which could be put on display, only a fraction of which would interest the visiting public.

Emma Biggs & Matthew Collings, Five Sisters, 2009. Monochromatic paintings are placed at either end of the mosaic.

Detail of the tesserae in Emma Biggs & Matthew Collings, Five Sisters, 2009.

So what is a museum to do with all these shards? Similarly, how is a city like York supposed to manage its past after 2,000 years of continuous history? This installation allows artifacts to be both used and seen, and the venue itself, a decommissioned thirteenth-century parish church, came about through parallel circumstances. York has 19 surviving medieval parish churches, a more than adequate supply for the population's present Anglican needs. For artists, creative expressions and materials and techniques always arise out of earlier ideas and labor, and these creations must always contend with the "greats" of the past. In this case, Biggs and Collings place their borrowings front and center for everyone to consider.

National Railway Museum, York

The Great Hall of the National Railway Museum holds train engines from Britain, Japan, and China. Some of the rolling stock hails from the nineteenth century.

During previous visits to York, I have always been too busy with research to stop in to the National Railway Museum, despite all the good press it receives. Fortunately, one of my stays here finally included a Sunday, which forces me to take a break from church visits (I was raised much too properly to wander the aisles staring upwards and scrutinizing the profiles of vault ribs as a vicar delivers his homily). I decided instead to apply my medieval mind to something much more modern.

Despite the obvious hypocrisy, this art historian find train enthusiasts to be very boring creatures overly concerned about defunct institutions and outdated technology. However, the museum takes care to tell how the history of train travel in Britain, and worldwide, changed leisure, trade, politics, and industry. Railroads opened up all sorts of opportunities and their historical course includes sites for everyone's interests. That and the place is full of huge locomotives that are big, heavy, expensive, powerful, and go faster and faster and faster. I admit I handed control of my afternoon over to childish enthusiasms, but I condoned my glee by reminding myself that I was tech-gawking at rolling stock, not high-powered war machines. Below are some photos. It's a little heavy on boy material (locomotives), but I assure everyone that I did take the time to see the beautifully appointed Royal carriages dating back to Queen Victoria.

The National Railway museum sits behind York's passenger terminal in what used to be the York Freight Depot Goods Warehouse for the Northeastern Railway Company.

The Duchess of Holland was built in 1938 and streamlined with ultra-sleek cladding, but all of its style was removed during World War II. Its shape and colors were only restored this year.

The NRM collection continues to expand. Here in "The Workshop" conservators labor to return the famous Flying Scotsman steam engine to working order.

The Mallard set the current world speed record for a steam-powered train in 1938: 126 mph.

The electric turntable at the center of the Great Hall helped trains at York station turn around from 1954 until the end of steam service in 1968. The museum holds daily demonstrations.

York Beer & Cider Festival

Today was my first full day in York. Fortunately, my time in the North coincides with the York Food and Drink Festival. This weekend CAMRA (Campaign for Real Ale) held a gathering at the racecourse. A serious crowd gathered around the grounds and inside the tents to taste beers and ciders from all over Britain.

My samplings from this afternoon from Yorkshire outfits included Ryedale Best by Cropton brewery, Sabbatic Ale from Great Heck, and Muston Scarecrow made by East Coast Brewing Co. in Filey. Another personal highlight was the Copy Lane Stout offered by Stables in County Durham. Plus, the festival featured a choice handful of food vendors to explore.

The three words every man longs to hear, "Fresh Pork Scratchings."

Then, up from among the carnival rides next door came six hot-air balloons in time for a sunset voyage.

Another high-flying venture from Sir Richard Branson.

Hard to beat.