New Staircase at Leighton House
November 9 2020
Picture: Leighton House Museum
Posted by Adam Busiakiewicz:
The Leighton House Museum in West London has managed to exceed its £17,300 target for the completion of a new art work. Oneness, a mural by the Iranian artist Shahrzad Ghaffari, will decorate a recently installed staircase to help provide a physical connection between new visitor facilities and exhibition spaces. The architectural addition will also introduce disabled access to all parts of the museum.
As their fundraising website explains:
In Oneness Ghaffari draws on a 13th-century Persian poem by Rumi exploring universal themes of love and knowledge, weaving words into abstract form. The central visual motif, the turquoise calligraphic brushstrokes, pays homage to the traditional designs of the Middle-Eastern tiles in Leighton’s Arab Hall while its spiralling form echoes the helical structure of the staircase. The mural will bring a fresh perspective on the fusion of cultures and the close relationship between art and architecture found in the Victorian interiors at Leighton House, creating ‘Oneness’ between the past, the present and the future of the museum.
