Suchergebnisse

The conservation of the statue of Cromwell by Hamo Thornycroft in 2009 (for full details and images see http://www.parliament.uk/about/visiting/exhibitions/cromwell_conservation.cfm) provided an opportunity to review the history of this most controversial of parliamentary statues both within the context of the proposed statue programme for the new palace of Westminster and the development of British sculpture which the Royal Commission for the Fine Arts hoped to encourage with its commissioning programme. Whilst 2009 marked the 350th anniversary of Cromwell's death it was the tercentenary of his birth in 1899 which brought forward a clutch of statues, including parliament's, reflecting the Victorian reassessment, and indeed repopularisation of Cromwell, as a historical figure.

The house of commons has recently acquired the medal awarded to Emmeline Pankhurst (1858–1928), founder of the Women's Social and Political Union (WSPU). This acquisition provides a timely reminder in 2008 that it is only 90 and 80 years respectively since women in Britain were granted the vote as well as marking the centenary of the 'rush' on the house of commons for which the medal was awarded. The 'rush' was just one of many occasions when members of the WSPU brought their campaign and protests to the Palace of Westminster. The palace was a site, both physically and ideologically, of suffragette protest, evidence of which remains on the building itself and, increasingly, as the acquisition of the medal suggests, in gestures of marking and remembrance of women's fight for the vote by parliament.