18th-Century Blues: Exploring the Melancholy Mind

'Before Depression' is a three-year research project by the English departments of the Universities of Northumbria and Sunderland and funded by the Leverhulme Trust. This exhibition brings together a range of artists who treated 'the blues' in their work. They include the influential Albrecht Durer, William Hogarth, Joshua Reynolds, George Romney, Joseph Wright, Thomas Rowlandson, William Blake, Maria Cosway, Thomas Jones, Jacob van Ruisdael, Caspar David Friedrich, Charles Le Brun, Johann Caspar Lavater, John Constable, John Martin and local artist Luke Clennell. Some were themselves depressive, some were interested in medical matters connected with the condition, some painted melancholy scenes, some even made fun of 'depression' for satirical purposes, and some painted friends and well-known figures who we know suffered from periodic low spirits. 18th-Century Blues offers a sometimes lively, sometimes sombre but, we hope, always thought-provoking insight into how people dealt with a common human experience two hundred years ago. Works are kindly loaned by The National Gallery, London; Tate; The National Portrait Gallery; The British Museum, London; The Wellcome Library, London; The Whitworth Art Gallery, University of Manchester; Derby Museums and Art Gallery; The Laing Art Gallery, Newcastle upon Tyne (Tyne and Wear Museums); The Hatton Gallery, Newcastle University and Petworth House, The Egremont Collection (acquired in lieu of tax by HM Treasury in 1957 and subsequently transferred to The National Trust).