Sailor's Bethel

Sometimes art reflects life rather than the other way around, and I was prompted about this curious building known as The Sailor's Bethel on a visit to The Laing Art Gallery in Newcastle. I recognised the unusual shape of the building when I saw it in a painting by Lowry, then realised I pass it every day on my way to and from work. I decided, rather than fly by, to go and take a proper look.

Situated on the corner of Horatio Street in Ouseburn, and seemingly teetering above the Tyne, it's held aloft by its perilously pointy spire. The spire is indicative of a religious building, but it doesn't look chunky enough for a church!

Built by North East Architect Thomas Oliver Junior and opened in 1877, the building cost £2,000. It's a prominent landmark above the Quayside. From the roadside side it looks like a one-floor building, but where the road splits from City Road and drops down to Horatio Street, it's a building of two floors.

The bright red brick now stands out against the modern housing on the Quayside and the shape of the building itself is not dissimilar to the shape of The Central Bar in Gateshead, a little like a coffin wedged into the parameters of its walls.

Unlike the busy scene in Lowry's painting, there was no one around when we visited, also on a grey day with a white sky. It was interesting to come straight from the Laing after having seen his painting exhibited as part of their special collection of North East paintings, brightly lit and treasured behind glass, to a mid-working week version where passersby were unfazed by the subject of famous paintings by both Lowry and Norman Cornish.

Lowry painted his version in 1965 and called it Old Chapel. He famously painted with a basic palette of five colours: ivory, black, Prussian blue, yellow ochre, vermilion and flake white. It looked very much the same in real life minus the people, who Lowry just added in for effect from sketches he made of real people in different scenarios.

Norman Cornish's simple sketch can be seen on the Norman Cornish website and doesn't appear to be exhibited currently anywhere. It looks like it's been knocked out in a hurried observation. I think I prefer it. Which one do you like most?

Watercolour was added to the final version, bringing to life from the page. It features two people looking like they're just heading home from Byker. Like Lowry's version, it's painted in a plain palette of similar colours with an emphasis on strong lines. Look at the railings, paving stones, cobbles and kerbs.

This painting was only discovered in 2014, but Lowry and Cornish were contemporaries and often frequented the same North Eastern views, both sharing the same agents.

The sky was exactly the same colour when we visited! Look at the photo below...maybe a little bluer!

Bethel is Hebrew for 'House of God', and as such, this small building was a nonconformist chapel. Simpler in style and structure, these chapels delivered religious services, held social gatherings and aided in the education of various groups. A Sunday school was held here, with an additional room being added to the end of the building in 1900.

I loved the pared-down look of this building with its unusual, memorable shape.

The Bethel is guarded by several curious creatures, like the gargoyles, two winged sky lions, chest out, wings back, from either side of the east end of the building. Sky lions were added to buildings to signify strength, vigilance and protection, perhaps from the North Sea, the strong winds or any uninvited invasion. In reality, they were added to building to act as a waterspout, conveying water away from the roof and preventing damage. The word gargoyle comes from the French 'gargouille' which means throat and relates to the onomatopoeic sound of the gurgling water.

The two smaller, more quirky window creatures I couldn't identify. What do you think they are, and what could they symbolise? Window monkeys?

The one element of churchy bling was the tall two-light east window that houses all of these window wonder creatures, that, and the needle-thin spire known as a flèche in architecture. It's an extremely slender spire made usually from wood and covered in lead.

This is really the only giveaway sign in the landscape that this is a building that housed religion.

It was interesting to have been prompted to visit after seeing Lowry's painting in the Laing, and after passing it each day on my way to work. It looked suitably unremarkable, going about its business, unlike the overblown subjects of many paintings; it was just like it was in his painting, only we were the only two people who'd have been painted if either Lowry or Cornish were here today!