Art in Cardiff

The visual arts in Cardiff have a much more recent history than many British cities, due to it being a very small town until rapid growth took place in the mid nineteenth century.

Wales was unusual because its concentration of visual artists occurred in rural areas (rather than urban centres), drawn there by the impressive scenery.

Both became Presidents of the Cardiff Naturalists' Society and when Thomas inherited a house on The Walk in 1880 this also became a place for intellectual discussion.

Instead, Seward and a group of artists created the South Wales Art Society in 1888, with an annual exhibition and lecture programme.

[1] To help fund a new Free Library a second Fine Art and Industrial Exhibition took place in Cardiff's Drill Hall in 1881.

[1] In 1883 the National Eisteddfod visited Cardiff and Thomas organised the art and craft exhibition and competition, the largest ever event of its kind in Wales at the time.

Local painter Edgar Thomas came to the attention and the Marquess of Bute sponsored his continuing art education as a result.

[5] Plans for a new museum were superseded by grander ambitions for new civic buildings on a much larger site, and it was not realised until after Cardiff achieved city status (1905).

[11] SWAS planned to have an annual exhibition, a lecture programme and a sketching club[10] and "offering to those who admire or appreciate, rather than practise, a means of cultivating a taste for Art".

However the group had national ambitions to promote radical and abstract Welsh art[13] and its other founding members were associated with areas outside of Cardiff, such as Newport, Carmarthen, Aberystwyth and the Rhondda valleys.

The event was set up in memory of a young graffiti writer, Bill Lockwood aka Roxe, who was killed in a road accident.

The main street art highlight of the event was the legal painting of a 140 m long wall which runs parallel to the Cardiff to Penarth railway line.

In October 2013 the Made in Roath collaborated with the Empty Walls project with the intention of painting murals and street art on neglected buildings.

Empty Walls festival sponsored by the Arts Council of Wales took the project to the city centre.

It brought together 20 local and international street artists and over 40 murals were painted over the two festivals, together with an indoor exhibition at Abacus.