I struggle with stately homes. Chocolate boxy reverence about our aristocratic heritage generally gets me grumpy. I'm sure in the right hands they could be reinvented to provide a more balanced historical education. A bit more of an EP Thompson meets Monty Python type mash up and a bit less National Trust. Chatsworth is no exception. Its a rather soulless and gaudy blot of bad taste in the midst of the calm beauty of the Peak District.
But I do like Sculpture. Especially big sculptures which create a jarring sense of 'presence' in the spaces they inhabit. And once a year Chatsworth goes all Yorkshire Sculpture Park on us with Beyond Limits.
And there's some great stuff.
I particularly liked the craggy faced 'Eros Bendato Screpolato' by Igor Mitoraj. Who looks like he's been quarried from some clay baked plain and and transplanted rather unceremoniously to the lush gardens of Chatsworth, waiting patiently for a latter day Ted Hughes to come along and rebuild him for the purposes of some sort of poetical world righting crusade (watch out Duke of Devonshire).
The other Iron Man in the show proves that place really does matter with these things and that maybe rich folk shouldn't be just picking them up and putting them down anywhere. Poor old Angel of the North gets shrunk back to the scale of the original model. And rather disorientatingly placed as Guardian of the Chatsworth canal pond. A rather shameful parody of the real Angel's protective stance overlooking the epic grandeur of Gateshead. Hopefully his bigger cousin will ride to the rescue and fix Junior up with a decent view.
Yayoi Kusama's Narcissus Garden is joyful. Every garden should have a big pond with a load of silver balls floating in it. Watchable for ages. Even though they don't really do anything. Although frankly post Rover in The Prisoner I never trust anything spherical that looks like it might have agency.
I suspect these ones get up to all kinds of sinister stuff when no one is looking.
My own personal 'oh look I'm a millionaire after all I'll have that one please' vote goes to Ju Ming's Tai Chi series. I really like the parallels between sculpture and Tai Chi. The sense creating form out of energy and in turn that form giving energy back to the space its in. Earthy and elemental. But also in these sculptures just a tiny bit ungainly and inelegant. Humorous and human.



