The British Museum has announced that it will loan “some of the rarest surviving examples” of Ice Age art to Bradford, the 2025 UK City of Culture.
Around 70 objects from the museum will be shown in the northern city as part of an exhibition titled “Ice Age Art Now.” It is the result of a partnership between the British Museum and Bradford District Museum & Galleries, and is slated to open at Cliffe Castle Museum in the town of Keighley, West Yorkshire, on June 21. The museum is 10 miles northwest of Bradford.
The exhibition will showcase works made in Europe toward the end of the last Ice Age, which ended 12,000 years ago. It is being curated by Jill Cook, the keeper of Britain, Europe, and Prehistory art at the British Museum.
“[Between 24,000 and 12,000 years ago], the slow recovery from near extinction caused by climate change stimulated an extraordinary artistic renaissance,” the British Museum said in a statement. “As the climate warmed, there was a vast increase in the production of drawings, sculptures, decorated tools and weapons, jewellery, and complex patterns. These artworks were not crucial to the physical survival of human groups but then, as now, art contributed to people’s psychological and emotional wellbeing, helping to establish the strong social bonds essential to sustaining their ways of life.”
The British Museum said that many of the objects in question are rarely loaned out due to their fragility and age. They include an old flint point found in France that’s 24,000 years old: “It reveals the ability and dexterity of the artisan, as well as the capacity to materialise and communicate ideas through the production of high-quality, non-functional objects.”
Two reindeer engraved on bone, found in France around 13,500 years ago, will also be on show, as well as an engraved bone pendant depicting a wolverine that’s roughly 13,000 years old. It was also discovered in France.
“[The end of the last Ice Age] saw the rise of small-scale engravings of incredible delicacy on bone, antler, ivory and stone, which were created alongside the more familiar images found on cave walls,” the museum said. “These drawings depict the animals that would have been relied upon for food and raw materials, such as bison, horse, ibex, and reindeer.”
The British Museum is also loaning Cliffe Castle Museum works by Rembrandt, Matisse, and Maggi Hambling for “Ice Age Art Now.” “[They are] included to highlight such essential elements of line, form, shading, composition and abstraction present in the long history of art, despite being separated by thousands of years,” it said.
Nicolas Cullinan, the British Museum’s director, said in a statement that he is “keen for the British Museum to be a lending library for the world – so it is fantastic to be able to announce this new exhibition, as part of the Bradford 2025 UK City of Culture programme.”
“Having grown up in West Yorkshire, the partnership with Bradford District Museums & Galleries is particularly meaningful to me,” he added.
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Bradford beat 20 other bids from cities including Wolverhampton, Exeter, and Wakefield to be crowned the UK City of Culture for 2025. Its heritage and diverse population are being celebrated until December, and the designation is expected to bring significant cultural and economic benefits to the region.
“For these incredible objects to be on display here in the north, in the stunning Cliffe Castle is a proud moment for the Bradford district,” Shanaz Gulzar, creative director of Bradford 2025 UK City of Culture, said.