Tom Jeffreys revels in an exhibition of Medieval-inspired Pre-Raphaelite art and design inside a sumptuous newly opened venue.
Built in 1895 for William Waldorf Astor (an ancestor of our dearly beloved Samantha Cameron), Two Temple Place is a simply stunning neo-Gothic mansion: all highly polished oak panelling, ludicrously vast fireplaces, exquisite stone floors – all adorned with as much carved wood as humanly conceivable. After being bought by banker Richard Hoare for the Bulldog Trust in 1999, the building has undergone an extensive programme of restoration so that now, at last, it's ready for the public.
The plan is to have annual exhibitions of work from 'provincial' galleries and collections, and things kick off in fine style with Story, Memory, Myth, an exploration of the importance of literature in the works of William Morris and chums. Most of the pieces on show come from the William Morris Gallery in Walthamstow – itself undergoing extensive refurbishment – as well as several key loans, and the result is a truly wondrous display of artistry, albeit of a kind that, like Two Temple Place itself, is something of an acquired taste.
True, it's not perfect. Some of the hanging is a little strange (the oak panels clearly caused the odd issue); some of the sections are less interesting than others (there's only so much wallpaper one can take); and there's the occasional real clash between the exhibited work and the venue – architect John Loughborough Pearson and Morris never saw eye to eye, apparently – but the overall effect is a rich and intoxicating one. 
The central tenet of the show is certainly strong: by delving into the literary influences that run through the works of Morris, Edward Burne-Jones, Ford Maddox Brown, Dante Gabriel Rossetti and others, curator Dr Esme Whittaker brings out a host of hidden (and not so hidden) allusions. And there's some great works on show – paintings, etchings, drawings, ceramic tiles, tapestries, wallpaper designs – the highlight probably a wall-to-ceiling tapestry of Pomona, unseen in public for 80 years.
But it's the tapestries on the ground floor that really do it for me. Exquisite pieces in their own right, they also demonstrate the way in which Chaucerian Medieval England was co-opted and prettified by the Pre-Raphaelites. These days, Chaucer is viewed as a rambunctious little imp with a delicious turn of phrase and unnerving ability to skewer the pretensions of his characters. Here though – and particularly in a trial page for the General Prologue – he's seen more like some sort of mystical visionary, Morris's depiction of his Roman de la Rose translation full of ethereal beauties. The Wife of Bath, alas, is nowhere to be seen.
What these tapestries do though is echo the shimmering magic of Chaucer's poetry – the threads of gold in Morris' beautiful constructions glinting like Chaucer's own hand-crafted language. In her talk at the media view, Whittaker, talks of the importance of narrative to Morris, Burne-Jones et al. This may be the case when it comes to Malory or the various fairytales, but really I think the opposite is true. What is key to this exhibition – to the works of Medieval poets and to Morris' own designs – is the importance of the symbol; its power to make us pause, to actually disrupt the flow of narrative.
Malory aside, Medieval poetry is characterised by extremely lengthy descriptions of character's appearances, their looks and their clothes, and of various symbolic elements: lovers' knots, knights' shields, girdles, garlands, wimples etc. The actual narrative often seems secondary to these powerful, extremely detailed (and occasionally a little overblown) narrative hold-ups.
The same could be said of Morris' famous patterns, and perhaps of Two Temple Place more generally. Devoid of narrative, these motifs focus entirely on a single object – a dove or rose or acanthus – in order, through repetition, to draw out its symbolic power, to provide a meditation upon the form of nature, and, indeed upon the very nature of form.
William Morris - Story, Memory, Myth is at Two Temple Place until 29th January 2012.
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