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The Sime Gallery offers outside talks relating to the Gallery, its collection and the life of Sidney Sime. These are ideal for groups such as the WI, U3A, local history societies and civic groups. The talks help promote our wonderful gallery and the fascinating work of Sidney Herbert Sime. We charge a competitive rate with all money made going back into the Gallery.
We can present at your group’s meeting place – browse talks and book below. Or we can arrange to give talks at the Gallery as part of a group visit – book on our Group Visits page.
A richly illustrated rags to riches tale, Sidney Sime’s life reads like a Victorian novel.
Sime was born in 1865 in Manchester, England and endured a difficult childhood which doubtless impacted on his mysterious, beguiling art; he spent five years down a coal mine and attended an industrial school. He then worked in a range of jobs before attending the Liverpool School of Art. Throughout his life Sime contributed illustrations to many publications and held several exhibitions. Upon moving to London, and later to Worplesdon, he formed strong connections with the fantasy writer Lord Dunsany and the playwright Lord Howard de Walden. He established a circle of talented and influential friends as well as links to other artists with whom he shared a fantastical artistic kinship.
Finally, hear about how the Sime Gallery was established in 1956 to preserve his fascinating artistic legacy.
36 local caricature drawings from the Sime Gallery collection once hung on the walls of the New Inn pub, where the locals were sketched by Sidney Sime in the 1920s. Sime sat with his glass of whisky focused on the local villagers and tradesmen reflected in the pub’s long mirror. Through diligent local history research, the Gallery has traced the lives and even photographs of some of his unwitting sitters. All have fascinating stories that depict the social history of the period.
Some “village types” caricatures (as Sime saw them) featured in his exhibition in St George’s Gallery London in 1927, although he changed their names. Others illustrated an article in The Sketch journal called “From a Caricaturist’s Sketch-Book”.
Stylistically very different from the fantastical illustrations and paintings that Sime is perhaps best known for, his local caricatures demonstrate the absorbing diversity of his artistic legacy and give the Gallery a wonderful sense of place and permeance in the beautiful Surrey village of Worplesdon.
Sidney Sime drew sketches of actors and actresses whose plays were reviewed weekly in Pick-Me-Up magazine under the title “Through the Opera Glass”. The reviews were penned under the pseudonym Jingle whose real name was Arnold Goldsworthy. Sime contributed to 102 issues between April 1896 and March 1898. The Gallery has a collection of 213 original theatrical caricatures. These weekly publications also included additional Sime illustrations.
Sime also produced theatrical caricatures for The Tatler in the early 1900s. 24 of these feature in our collection.
Sime’s caricatures included all the great names of the music hall and theatre of the era. He would visit two to three times to study his subject’s face from the stalls or consider them from a dark corner of the pit noting their gestures and attitude. His favourites were Dan Leno and Sarah Bernhardt. After hearing about some of the great actors who will be your favourite? Sime drew nine actors who were knighted and four actresses who became Dames. Many were actor/managers, some were singers, even acrobats. All have fascinating stories for us to tell.
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