Part of my placement at The Turnpike included the opportunity to explore the Wigan and Leigh Archive. Sitting next door to The Turnpike, the archive holds many of the photographs and exhibition flyers from the past four decades. Exhibitions Coordinator Matt Retallick asked me to explore what the gallery was like in the days gone by and consider how the gallery might present this history to the visitors.
Built in 1971, The Turnpike Centre is located in a modern, concrete building in the Civic Square in Leigh. The intention of having this very modern architecture design in the middle of a small town and right across the former town hall was a bold and challenging idea. The ambition was to bring modern art into the community and share a new culture with the neighbourhood. Launched with a Henry Moore’s show as the first exhibition in 1971, it allowed the local visitors to experience high quality  modern art for the first time. After the recent closure for a couple of years, The Turnpike is lucky to have Helen Stalker, previous curator at Whitworth, as Director of the gallery to re-establish the space. Although the gallery programme has developed differently in decades, the new Turnpike gallery shares the same idea with its original intention which is to bring something new to Leigh.
During the research, I found many photographs of the building itself. With The Turnpike occupying the first floor and the Leigh Library on the ground level, positioned in a modern architecture designed by J.C. Prestwich. Surrounded by Victorian buildings such as the town hall and St Mary’s Catholic church, the modernity of the concrete building seems astonishing. It is a landmark building at the heart of Leigh’s town centre which brings contemporary art to the community in Northern West England.
This research, focusing on the exhibitions between 1971 and 1980, discovered that The Turnpike had exhibited many great artists such as Henry Moore and L. S. Lowry. The opening of the gallery was marked by an exhibition of sculpture, drawings and graphics by Henry Moore. I found that the archive contained many images of the building, but few of the internal spaces and exhibitions. Fortunately, one photograph of Henry Moore’s sculpture exists. The sculpture is Two Piece Reclining Figure No.3 which contains two separated pieces of a reclining figure which stands in the square in front of the gallery. The image clearly shows the Catholic church in the background, offering a brilliant constrast of visual styles. Because of the large scale of Henry Moore’s sculpture, some of them are exhibited outdoor and others remained indoor. It could be said the building’s architecture design and artworks such as Moore’s must have been very contemporary for the local community.
Clearly, the  gallery’s early ambition was to bring in something new and different to this small town. The archive also contains exhibition flyers and local journals. A microfilm scanner was used to look at historic newspapers which announced every current exhibition in the gallery.
This experience was a great opportunity for me to practice archive research and learn the history of a gallery. Through my research, it is seen that the gallery has always insisted its original intention throughout decades. The images have shown that the gallery was interested in bringing new art and holding events for the people in Leigh. Maria Balshaw, current Director of Tate (former Director of the Whitworth, Manchester) attended the recent exhibition opening at The Turnpike and commented on this vision, saying that it was important to have The Turnpike in the Northern West of England to connect the artists and people and to regenerate the cultural industry.