The Watts Cemetery Chapel

Compton Cemetery Chapel is a grade I listed building, created by Mary Watts (1849‒1938) between 1894 and 1904. This new book on the building is a guide to the symbolism of the glorious Arts and Crafts patterns that decorate its interior and exterior. Mary’s book, The Word in the Pattern, which outlined her ideas for the symbols, along with the sources that she drew upon, forms the basis of the text. Illustrating all the decorative detail of the chapel, it shows the richness of meaning with which Mary infused its imagery. It is, in effect, a key to the symbols of the building as Mary Watts understood them. She knew that her carefully planned symbolism was both ‘exoteric and esoteric in its character, being in some instances so plain and simple… and in others so hidden and intricate…’ and so would not be immediately open to all who saw it. This guide seeks to make Mary’s ideas clear to all those who wish to know the meanings of the striking figurative and abstract symbols that adorn the building. To Mary, a symbol was a ‘magic key’ that ‘unlocks a door into a world of enchantment.’ It is the hope that this guide will enhance both understanding and enjoyment of this wonderful building.

Mark Bills is curator of Watts Gallery. Formally he was senior curator of paintings, prints and drawings at the Museum of London and visual arts officer at the Russell-Cotes Art Gallery and Museum. He has published widely on eighteenth and particularly nineteenth century art, including William Powell Frith and G F Watts, Victorian Visionary, and numerous articles for magazines including the Burlington Magazine and Apollo. He has curated national and international exhibitions including A Victorian Salon, at the Dahesh Museum, New York and Satirizing London, at the Museum of London with the accompanying book The Art of Satire: London in Caricature, also published by Philip Wilson Publishers.