Floral tribute at gallery

BACK to nature . . . A Summer Idyll by E A Hornel from 1908

BLOOMING marvellous! The latest exhibition to greet visitors to Gallery Oldham has a distinctly floral theme.

Forget Me Not: The Language Of Flowers, until December 4, celebrates the beauty of blooms and looks at some of their hidden meanings.

Different flowers can carry meaning in a symbolic language all of their own, from the purity of the lily to the true love of the forget-me-not.

The beauty of flowers has been celebrated by artists and designers for centuries and the exhibition brings together many items from the Gallery’s fine art, textiles and ceramics collections that use blooms in a range of decorative and imaginative ways.

Visitors will get the chance to see pressed flowers from the Gallery’s extensive herbarium collection, amazing plant models and fine botanical illustrations from the natural history library.

The exhibition is designed especially to be family friendly, with two themed activity areas.

Younger visitors can dress up, draw and find out what makes flowers so special and there is also the chance to identify plant specimens and learn more about the fascinating insects that they attract.

Sean Baggaley, exhibitions and collections co-ordinator, said: “It is great to see Gallery Oldham using our fascinating collections to explore the beauty of flowers.

“After Oldham’s success last year in North-West in Bloom I’d recommend that visitors to the exhibition follow up their trip with a walk in one of the borough’s beautiful parks.”