Rosemary Goodenough’s work is collected internationally. She is the first female artist to have a sculpture ‘A Woman in Motion’ (Artist’s Proof#1) on permanent display inside Lambeth Palace in the Lambeth Palace Art Collection celebrating Margery Kempe (1373-1439) as a Pilgrim. Number 1 in the Limited Edition of 12 is displayed in the Minster in King’s Lynn, Norfolk.

Artist’s Proof #1 of her series of 5 Sculptures (a limited edition of 3 plus 2 artist’s proofs) celebrating Eleanor of Aquitaine was bought by Professor Janina Ramirez, FRSA FRHistS. Visiting Professor in Medieval Studies, University of Lincoln, Research Fellow in History of Art, Harris Manchester College, University of Oxford and BBC Historian and Presenter and Author.

Rosemary Goodenough has works in Private Collections in Boston, Cape Town, Edinburgh, Geneva, Glasgow, Essex, London, New York, Norfolk, Northamptonshire, Oxford, Paris and Tennessee.

JUNE 2025: INAUGURATION OF ‘A WOMAN IN MOTION’ INTO THE LAMBETH PALACE PERMANENT ART COLLECTION.

Danny Johnson MVO - Archbishops’s Special Projects Director

‘The Lambeth Palace Art Collection: A Living Legacy of Faith, History and Welcome’

Lambeth Palace is proud to welcome Rosemary Goodenough’s sculpture ‘A Woman in Motion’ into its collection - a powerful and evocative tribute to Margery Kempe, one of the most remarkable and resilient women in the history of the Church.

This sculpture does more than commemorate a singular life; it invites reflection on the often-overlooked contributions of women to the spiritual and ecclesiastical life of the Church across the centuries. Margery Kempe, mystic, pilgrim and author of the first autobiography in the English language was a woman of profound faith and extraordinary courage. Her journey bought her to Lambeth Palace in the early 15th century, where she sought validation for her spiritual call and endured public humiliation and threats of persecution.

Through Goodenough’s sensitive and symbolic rendering, we are reminded of the trials Margery faced not only as a woman of deep conviction in a time of doctrinal suspicion, but as a voice of spiritual authority in a world that often sought to silence her. The sculpture’s torn yet graceful robes, the hidden hands trembling with fear and the bowed head in prayer all speak to the tension between vulnerability and strength, persecution and perseverance.

By placing ‘A Woman in Motion’ in the historic setting of Lambeth Palace we acknowledge both the pain and the progress of the Church’s journey, particularly for women. This work becomes a vital educational touchstone prompting guests and visitors to consider the evolving role of women in the Church - from the margins to the centre of spiritual life and leadership.

We are grateful to Rosemary Goodenough for her vision and to all who continue to illuminate the stories of women like Margery Kempe whose faith and fortitude continue to inspire.

SPEECH AT THE ‘RECEPTION OF WELCOME’ OF ‘A WOMAN IN MOTION’ INTO THE

LAMBETH PALACE ART COLLECTION JUNE 2025

Rosemary Goodenough - Sculptrix

Margery Kempe is one of the most fascinating characters I've ever come across. When The Reverend Canon Dr. Mark Dimond Vicar of King's Lynn Minster commissioned me to make a sculpture for permanent installation in the Minster celebrating the 650th anniversary of her birth in King's (then Bishop's) Lynn I was thrilled as I have a bit of a thing about Medieval Women and he had seen my series of sculptures celebrating Eleanor of Aquitaine.

I started my research by of course reading 'The Book of Margery Kempe' the first autobiography in the English language and at the beginning found her intensely irritating, actually completely maddening and thought she was merely attention seeking. Nowadays of course she would be treated for post-natal depression but in the early 15th Century she was just seen as bonkers and possibly heretical which put her in harms way many times. By the time I had finished reading her book, the irritation remained but to a much lesser degree and I found myself absolutely convinced by her sincerity and the profoundness of her faith. Professor Anthony Bale's book 'A Mixed Life' was hugely informative and beautifully written so please take a bow Anthony ......... as was ‘Femina’ by Professor Janina Ramirez who very much wanted to join us this evening but sadly is on a plane to China right now so unable to be here. Having seen and loved my sculpture of Margery Kempe she bought one complete set of all 5 of my series of sculptures celebrating Eleanor of Aquitaine one her great heroines which was fantastic. 'Femina' was the word used by Monks during the Reformation and was stamped on books by or about women - meaning to be destroyed, Janina describes how 'The Book of Margery Kempe' somehow escaped destruction and was lost until the 1930's when it was discovered in a cupboard during a game of ping pong when a ball flew off the table and shot through a crack in the cupboard door in a country house. The owner was quite happy to chuck all the old papers onto a bonfire but thankfully one of his guests was a curator at the V & A and recognised its significance!

There is only one other sculpture celebrating Margery Kempe which is on the Camino in Spain and depicts her as a writer so I thought I would focus on her life as an incredibly doughty and intrepid Pilgrim, extraordinarily challenging for a woman in the 15th century and of course being Margery she drove everyone about her up the wall, she really was entirely lacking in any sense that she could make her own life easier. I have depicted her wearing white as that is what she was convinced Jesus had commanded her to do and for which she was prosecuted and persecuted and indeed here in Lambeth Palace a woman wanted her to be burned at the stake in Smithfield, a terrifying prospect which is why she kept her hands tucked inside her clothes as they shook so much but she felt the need to speak robustly in her own defence without appearing to be afraid. She walked in the gardens here at Lambeth Palace with Archbishop Arundel and clearly bought him round to thankfully believing in her sincerity. I had her cast in Aluminium as a nod to her love of fine clothes and also because to my mind it has a more spiritual sensibility than bronze which to me is more about power and of course her robes have been laquered bright white. Her 'top-knot' is my way of denoting her indomitable spirit, both secular and religious as described in Anthony's book about her wish to live 'A Mixed Life'.

A couple of final things. You may be interested to hear that at the end of the pouring of the aluminium at the Foundry, there was a for me and my husband Michael Waller-Bridge a very moving moment as the two foundrymen whose work I am in awe of, removed their helmets and gauntlets, looked straight at each other and shook hands - a great tradition marking the end of the most dangerous part of the lost wax process that has been unchanged for about 6,500 years. This courtesy ritual always marks the end of the day of Pouring and the mutual respect between them felt very emotional as it is a very dangerous environment.

I cannot thank Danny Johnson enough, it has been a complete joy working with him and his passion for and profound knowledge about Lambeth Palace is utterly inspiring and I could not be more thrilled with his decision to place Margery Kempe in such a strategically relevant position - the Lollards Tower to her left, the Archbishop's Chapel ahead of her and within that, the balcony leading to the room to where Archbishop Cranmer wrote the Book of Common Prayer, to my mind some of the most beautiful writing in the English language. It is a great honour for me as Danny kindly told me that I am the first female artist to have a sculpture inside Lambeth Palace and it is now part of the Permanent Art Collection here.

Thank you as ever to my husband Michael Waller-Bridge without whose morale boosting presence and love I would be bereft.

A NEW MARGERY KEMPE FOR KING’S LYNN MINSTER

James Rye 2026

King’s Lynn Minster is a building that tends to make people look up. The stone pulls the eye into height and distance, and the effect can be slightly impersonal, as if the past is something you observe rather than meet. That is one reason Rosemary Goodenough’s A Woman in Motion works so well there. It is not monumental. It does not try to compete with the architecture. Instead it draws you down and inward, and it does so in a place that matters. This is Kempe’s own church, St Margaret’s, now the Minster, the setting for much of her ordinary devotional life as well as the starting point for the extraordinary parts.

The sculpture was unveiled on 4 February 2023, commissioned as a permanent installation marking the 650th anniversary of Kempe’s birth (c. 1373). The service itself was intentionally public and civic as well as ecclesiastical, with Lord Dannatt unveiling the work and the Bishop of Norwich, Graham Usher, preaching. That framing matters because it signals a choice: the Minster is not merely acknowledging Kempe as a famous person to be “mentioned”, but taking a clear line that she belongs within the building’s story and within the town’s present-day identity.

Not a “Portrait Statue

We are used to commemorative sculpture that offers certainty: a recognisable face, a confident pose, a tidy message. Goodenough does none of that, and it is not a failure of likeness. It is a refusal of a kind of memorial language that Kempe, of all people, would not fit.

Kempe is a figure known chiefly through words, and not through words that allow the reader to settle comfortably. In her Book, she is devout, dramatic, persistent, sometimes courageous, sometimes exasperating, and frequently at odds with those around her. A conventional portrait would risk turning her into an agreeable emblem. A Woman in Motion is better described as a visual argument about what sort of person Kempe was, or at least how she is best remembered: not settled, not quiet, not easily contained.

Even the title performs that argument. It begins with “woman”, not mystic, not saint, not visionary, and then places “motion” at the centre. That choice is historically alert. Kempe’s spiritual life was never purely interior. It spilled out, literally, into streets and ships, shrines and hostels, courts and church porches. A static, polished Kempe would be a contradiction.

Commission, Material, and Scale

Goodenough’s own information about the work provides two practical details that strongly shape the viewer’s experience. First, scale. She lists the sculpture at roughly 76 cm high, with a narrow width and depth, and records it as part of a limited edition, the Minster casting being “#1 of 12”. This is not a grand civic monument in the market place. It is closer to human encounter. You approach it as you would approach a person who has paused, not as you would approach a structure.

Second, material. The sculpture is cast in aluminium, and Goodenough treats that as meaningful rather than simply functional, connecting it to ideas of abundance and endurance, and linking those to Kempe’s life as a mother as well as her life as a pilgrim. In the Minster setting, the metal also matters because it responds to light in a way stone cannot. The figure does not feel visually fixed. It shifts as you shift, which reinforces the work’s central theme without requiring any explanatory label.

A Pilgrim, Not a Town Mascot

The immediate impression is not of a respectable local benefactor or a softened “heritage Margery”. It is of a traveller, a pilgrim, someone marked by leaving and returning. That emphasis is a corrective. It pushes against the habit of treating Kempe as simply a local curiosity or a convenient “first” in literary history.

Modern pilgrimage writing has increasingly presented her in exactly these terms. Pilgrim Ways describes her as an “indefatigable” pilgrim and uses the Minster as an anchor point in the geography of her life, a place of worship that stands behind the more dramatic narrative of travel. In that reading, the sculpture is doing something quite subtle: it fixes Kempe in her home church while simultaneously insisting that what defines her is the road.

There is also a deeper honesty in presenting her as a pilgrim rather than as a saintly icon. Pilgrimage in late medieval life could be admirable, suspicious, socially disruptive, spiritually productive, and practically dangerous, sometimes all at once. Kempe’s own journeys attracted admiration from some and hostility from others. A pilgrim Kempe belongs to that messy reality. A domesticated Kempe does not.

Facing the West Door

One short detail, noted by the Margery Kempe Society, sharpens the whole installation: the figure faces the West Door, the threshold through which Kempe would have stepped out into the medieval world. It is the sort of choice that looks obvious only after someone has made it.

The effect is powerful because it ties posture to direction. The head inclines, suggesting prayer and inwardness, but the body’s orientation suggests departure. The Minster becomes not only the site of devotion, but the last interior space before the road. It gives visitors an easy way to grasp the tension that runs through Kempe’s life: rootedness without stillness, belonging without containment.

For a guided explanation, this is the single best point to begin with. It is concrete, visual, and it avoids reducing Kempe to slogans. Most people can understand “she is praying, but she is facing the door” in a heartbeat. From there you can unfold the larger story.

An Awkward Medieval Woman

Installing a contemporary sculpture is, inevitably, a decision about modern values as well as medieval history. The Minster could have commissioned a safe, quasi-medieval figure that would sit politely in the visual background. Instead it accepted a work that many viewers find striking, and some find unsettling. That too is appropriate. Kempe’s contemporaries did not experience her as comfortable.

Her authority was repeatedly contested in her own lifetime. She was a laywoman, married, a mother, and she insisted on a kind of devotional presence that many people did not grant to women in that form. She travelled, spoke, wept publicly, and refused to withdraw into the private sphere when others demanded it. To place her permanently in the Minster now is to take the risk of remembering her honestly. It is to say, in effect, that sanctity or spiritual seriousness is not always neat, and that the parish church has room for a figure who challenged the expectations of her neighbours.

What the Sculpture Achieves

Seen in person, A Woman in Motion feels like a pause rather than a conclusion. It does not tell you what to think about Kempe, and it does not pretend that she was universally admired. Instead it gives you a stance and a direction, prayer and departure held together, and it lets the Minster’s space complete the meaning.

In that sense it is an unusually successful piece of public history. It does not flatten Kempe into a “first autobiographer” label, nor does it sentimentalise her into a harmless local saint. It preserves the defining truth: she belonged to Lynn, and she did not stay put.

© James Rye 2026

“ET IN ARCADIA EGO”

A Personal Appreciation by Christopher Penn - Private Art Consultant

Rosemary Goodenough’s new work is inspired by nature. 

She paints the trees and flowers, the oceans and mountain lakes that she so obviously loves in the hope, I suspect, that we will feel the same sense of wonder and delight in the natural world as she does. 

But she does not try to achieve this by describing, in paint, the colour and texture of the branch of a tree or the intricate detail of a flower in bloom. You will not recognise the familiar profile of a mountainous skyline as none of these things are her concern. 

These paintings do not record physical or topographical details. They express, to more profound effect, the constantly changing feelings and sensations we experience when immersed in nature. When she paints trees, we can believe that we hear the wind rustling in their leaves. When she paints a flower, we know instinctively that its scent is intoxicating. We can almost breathe the cool mountain air. The artist is engaging not just our visual, but our full range of sensory perception. 

There is a lyrical quality to her work, which hovers somewhere between abstraction and impressionism. At one moment, as the titles of her works reveal, she is calling up the sound and feel of soft rain, the next a cool breeze and then, perhaps, the changing light. These are the things that stimulate our memories of the places we have loved long after the visual detail is forgotten. The images, just as our recollections, are indistinct.

But there is also a tension in what might otherwise be mistaken for mere sentimentality. There is a dark and mysterious quality to these paintings and, if there is a gentle hint of sadness too, it is only the yearning for something lost but fondly remembered.  

I wonder whether these evaporating images might also be alluding to the gradual degradation of the world they describe through climate change? Even if unintended, the point is quietly but powerfully made by simply reminding us of the fading glories of nature that might one day be lost for ever. 

It comes as no surprise to learn that Rosemary Goodenough is not only a painter but also a sculptor. As with her sculptures, these paintings are also carefully crafted, sometimes with a knife, a cloth or even her hands.

If you prefer to look at them for their simple beauty alone, you will be just as generously rewarded.

‘TWO WAYS OF SEEING’

Amanda Geitner - Director, East Anglia Art Fund

This exhibition features recent work by artists Jules George from Suffolk and Rosemary Goodenough from Norfolk, bringing together two distinct approaches to the landscape. The title of the exhibition, suggested by Rosemary Goodenough, draws on the influential 1972 television series and subsequent book by John Berger, Ways of Seeing, which explored the ways in which ‘every image embodies a way of seeing’ and how we look and express what we see reveals something of significance about us. 

Rosemary Goodenough has been an artist for over 50 years - self-taught, she cannot remember a time when she did not draw or paint. She now works exclusively in her studio in Norfolk, painting directly to the board or panel without prior sketches or studies, taking pleasure in the colour, sweep and slide of her medium. There is never a plan or clear intention, works are painted in the moment, entirely of her imagination, the life of her mind reflected in echoes of the world – finding form in landscapes and seascapes, trees and flowers. 

Moments of representation - a copse of trees or fallen petals from a flower – conjure places remembered or convey the beauty of both life and decay. Perhaps even more evocative is the artist’s construction of space within her paintings. Deepest pools of colour are brought to the surface with impasto that is applied with hands and palette knives. Thinner veils of colour are applied with a cloth, the different areas of the painting worked with the corresponding hand, Goodenough is entirely ambidextrous.  Remarkably, Goodenough is also synaesthetic - a linking of sight and sound which means that colours and form have equivalence to music, allowing her to orchestrate her palette. Single works explore the full range of a pigment - in its most translucent application ‘sap green’ glows almost with palest yellow and at its most intense forms a dense emerald black. This grand chromatic scale sings on the board. 

Some of these most recent works have been years in mind before being realised on the board. The other-worldly Moonfleet was 8 years in process. Sea Fever was inspired by the John Masefield poem -  I must go down to the seas again, to the lonely sea and the sky … The ethereal forms sail in an unknown sea, in transit from one world to another, capturing in their sails not only the motion of wind and water but a sense of memory, loss and longing. 

“Every Mark Is A Decision” – Rosemary Goodenough

If you are interested in commissioning a work please email me via the Contact Form. Thank you.

EXHIBITIONS & COMMISSIONS

2025:

ING DISCERNING EYE EXHIBITION

Mall Galleries London 14th - 23rd November

LAMBETH PALACE PERMANENT ART COLLECTION

Unveiled in June, ‘A Woman in Motion’ a sculpture celebrating the 650th anniversary of the birth of Margery Kempe depicting her as a pilgrim joined the Permanent Art Collection at Lambeth Palace in London and is displayed at the entrance to the Archbishop’s Chapel looking towards the Altar. Artist’s Proof #1.

2023:

ECCLESIASTICAL COMMISSION

Sculpture for Permanent Installation in King’s Lynn Minster ‘A Woman in Motion’ celebrating the 650th anniversary of the birth of Margery Kempe. depicting her as a pilgrim. #1 of 12.

2022:

Two Ways of Seeing, Gallery East, Suffolk

2016:

British Embassy Tokyo, Japan.

2015:

Invited by Rolls-Royce Motor Cars to join their Ambassador Programme profiled in the first edition of their new brand magazine.

2012:

CORPORATE CHARITY COMMISSION

BT ArtBox for ChildLine – ‘About A Child’ Displayed at the NSPCC HQ London

 2011:

Wildwood Gallery, Suffolk

The Wicken Vineyard, Suffolk

2010:

Art at the Park, Suffolk

Highwayman’s Gallery, Suffolk

2007:

Dio Arts Launch - Auckland, New Zealand

2006:

CORPORATE COMMISSION

Eurostar Concourse London - 'Aphrodite's Battlewagon' an ArtCar for Vauxhall's Exhibit V for the London Motor Show in association with Magic FM and Visit London

EXHIBITIONS:

Galerie Landertinger Wagner, Salzburg, Austria

The Arts Club, Dover Street

London, Berlin, Milan and Barcelona for Visit London 

2005:

Ryder Street Gallery, London

Home House, London

Spectrum Fine Art, London

 2004:

Guest Art Editor, Archidom Magazine, Moscow

2003:

A & D Gallery London

Biennale Internazionale Dell'Arte Contemporanea, Florence

2001:

Dauntons, London

International Notting Hill Arts Exhibition, London

ING Barings London

2000:

La Brocca, London

Cafe Royal, London

The City Gallery London

ING Barings London

Merchant Company Hall, Edinburgh

Millenium Year Resident Artist for the Green Gallery, Stirlingshire, Scotland.

1999:

Pollyanna Gallery, Barnsley

Royal Scottish Academy, Edinburgh

ING Barings, London

1998:

Ozten Zeki Gallery, Walton Street London

Savoy Hotel London

Lux Centre, Hoxton Square London