Picture this . . .

A PAIR of paintings by the late John Houghton Hague have been handed to Gallery Oldham.

A family member has donated the works, along with a diary and a notebook which belonged to Mr Houghton Hague, who died in 1934.

The paintings depict Oldham cottage interiors and date from the end of the 19th century. When he died at the age of 92, Mr Houghton Hague was described by the local press as one of Oldham’s most outstanding personalities.

The artist moved to Oldham with his parents in the 1860s, when his father Samuel founded a cotton spinning business.

He was educated at boarding school in Altrincham and at the Manchester School of Art.

After working in his family’s mill for a short time, he studied art in France and later became a teacher at the Oldham School of Art which was in the Lyceum on Union Street.

Mr Houghton Hague was both a landscape and figure painter and most of his work was done in and around Oldham. He sketched a lot of his work in Chadderton Fold — then a rural hamlet.

Stephen Whittle, Gallery Oldham manager, said: “The paintings are a fascinating first-hand description of living conditions in Oldham at the end of the 19th century.”