There were two John Tradescants, father and son, operating in the 17th century as travellers and gardeners from a base in south London. Their family tomb is at the heart of the garden surrounding the Garden Museum in the former church of St Mary-at-Lambeth in Lambeth Palace Road, a garden designed as a Tradescant memorial 30 years ago by the Dowager Marchioness of Salisbury.
This hallowed place has been the principal subject for the past year of the painter Charlotte Verity (born 1954), the museum’s first artist-in-residence. The initiative has been generously funded by the Cochemé Trust, and the results of Verity’s year-long residency are now on show in the museum’s new gallery.
A handsome publication has been produced to celebrate the event, with useful texts by garden writer Sarah Langton-Lockton and art historian Simon Wilson, and a generous selection of extracts from the artist’s own journal.
The exhibition is not a dramatic affair, but it strikes a sustained note of quiet and affectionate commemoration which is no less affecting for being low-key.
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