A View of the Herbert by Kai Weekes

04 July 2013

This is my review of the Coventry Herbert Art Gallery and what I think of this Gallery, but first of all I'm going to tell you a little about myself, my name is Kai Weekes and I'm and go to a secondary school called Blue coat Church of England which is an Academy but no one really calls it 'Bluecoat Academy' because it sounds weird and unusual. Bluecoat isn't far from the Herbert Art Gallery so I've been a couple amounts of times and thought it was ok but nothing special. 

Since I had started my work experience I have found out a lot of amazing things I never knew before. Things like who set up the gallery originally was a man called Sir Alfred Herbert the person who came up with a magnificent machine (back in the 1930's) which could produce parts for bicycles and cars instead of just having to make the whole item. 
Sir Alfred Herbert sold his machines all over the world and became rich and donated £100,000 to build the Herbert Art Gallery and Museum in 1938 on a place owned the Council. Sadly because of the Second World War building stopped and resumed in the 1950's with Sir Alfred Herbert donating another £100,000 and a Foundation stone being laid down by him. He died in 1957 three years before the Herbert Gallery and Museum opened. 

In the gallery there are nine permanent ones and four temporary exhibition spaces but three of these are used as one. These are called: Art since 1900, Connected, Elements, Old Masters, Peace and Reconciliation, Sculpture, What's in store, History Gallery, Discover Godiva, the Studio and Galleries 1,2,3,4. There's also a Medieval Undercroft which was discovered under the Herbert and is a real medieval basement. 

My two favourite galleries in the Herbert Art Gallery are the History Gallery and Peace and Reconciliation. The History Gallery is one of my favourites because you go right back to the early ages of Coventry being a place and also turning into a city which is special because it can give you an idea of what Coventry was like before any of us existed and see what they use and what their lives were like compared to the ones we're living now. 

You can also see certain items from Coventry's history in the gallery and find out things you never knew about Coventry before and it's all in one place – there's loads to discover!!!! The three things I liked most in the History gallery was the machine created by Sir Alfred Herbert because without it there wouldn't be the Herbert Art Gallery and Museum. The choir chair benches was another object I liked because the chair/bench was made out of hard wood so it must have been painful to sit on for so long. The students must have been in some good pain bearing in mind that people managed to sit on it for so long and there were also markings on the table from where the students were playing with marbles and they left big grooves in the table so the marbles have had to been hard sturdy marbles. The third object I liked from History Gallery was the turnstiles from Coventry's old stadium Highfield Road because it's a piece of history from Coventry's playing days at Highfield Road because of all the fans that passed through it in order to watch there beloved Coventry City play. 

My reason for choosing Peace and Reconciliation as my other favourite gallery is because of its meaning to the people of Coventry and how they came together with the people of Dresden and resolved everything that happened with each other and the Peace and Reconciliation gallery represents it in a very good way, but that’s my opinion. My favourite three objects from this gallery are the Coventry Strasse sign which was in France because it named this after the raid on Coventry but British soldiers took it back to Britain with them and presented it to Coventry after the war ended. My second favourite object is the box of mass grave dirt which is in the museum because Dresden gave it to the Coventry trade union as link between the two cities. My third and final favourite object is the flashpoint game because it's about people choosing to help others out or leaving them to fend for themselves. It's like in the wars when places were bombed or run out of their cities and homes and others choose to help them out, that’s the reason why I like the game because it can relate to so many things that have happened in the world.

I didn't mention the other galleries because I want you to come see the galleries for yourself. It wouldn't be a waste of time if you came to the Herbert Art Gallery and Museum because you would learn and enjoy looking around the Herbert. 

Kai Weekes aged 15 years