Country lives: Exploring the English countryside from 1800
This exhibition ran from Thursday 10 April until Sunday 21 September 2025, at the Weston Gallery, Lakeside Arts.
Come to the countryside!
Discover how the countryside has been used and depicted over the last 200 years. From idyllic and picturesque scenes to the realities of rural life, ‘Country Lives’ explored the powerful and enduring impact the English countryside has had on people.
The English countryside has long been a place to live, work, play, explore, protest and reimagine. ‘Country Lives’ highlighted how writers, artists, tourists, rural inhabitants and workers depicted the countryside, showing what it meant to different people.
Items from Manuscripts and Special Collections, including photographs, sketches, books, letters, maps and board games, were brought together for the first time to illuminate a wide range of country lives and different aspects of the countryside.
This exhibition was jointly curated by University of Nottingham Libraries, Manuscripts and Special Collections, and Dr Sarah Holland, Department of History, University of Nottingham.
Exhibition themes
Six exhibition boards were on display in the Gallery. Each of the boards can be downloaded or viewed online as Adobe PDF.
Further Research
Items from our collections are available to consult in the Manuscripts and Special Collections reading room on King's Meadow Campus.
Country lives is focused on the Nottinghamshire and Derbyshire countryside. Links to collections relating to the themes featuring in the exhibition can be found below.
Films
Depictions of the English Countryside in the Twentieth Century
David Matless, Professor of Cultural Geography at the University of Nottingham, explores the representation of the English countryside, showing how the depiction of rural landscape was also held to say something about England as a country. Images of English rural work and leisure illustrate issues of culture and politics which continue to shape country lives in the twenty-first century.
Health and the Countryside
The countryside was often thought of as a healthy place during the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. However, this could mask the realities for those living and working there. In this talk, Dr Sarah Holland, Associate Professor of History at the University of Nottingham, will explore ideas and lived experiences relating to health and the countryside.
Folk custom and rural communities - the making and remaking of the Randwick Wap
Folklore and folk customs have played an important role in the history of rural communities. In this talk, Jessica Lloyd-May explores what a case study of the Randwick Wap, a May custom that takes place in the village of Randwick, Gloucestershire, tells us about different aspects of folk customs. Using a variety of sources, connections between rural community, folk custom and wider interest in folklore studies are made.
From the blog
Read our blog about items associated with the Country lives exhibition.
Doctoring Derbyshire
Country lives features diaries, photographs, letters and publications collected by Dr Edward Wrench of Baslow, Derbyshire. Read all about this fascinating (and very busy!) man.
Go to blog post
On the Land
Sharing a selection of items from our collections which can give us insight into how the countryside has been used and depicted in the past.
Go to blog post
Lady Rozelle Raynes
The Thoresby Estate features in the Country lives exhibition as a case study of providing access to the countryside for visitors. Lady Rozelle Raynes was the estate's owner, but her first love was sailing
Go to blog post
Forest Town
The coal mining boom of the late 19th and early 20th centuries had a lasting impact on the countryside. In 1920 over a million people were employed in coal mines across the United Kingdom, and many of them lived in purpose-built colliery villages like Forest Town.
Go to blog post
Events
A programme of associated talks and events was held at Lakeside Arts.
Recordings of the lunchtime talks are available on this webpage under the 'Films' section.
Changing Rural Landscape: a guided walk of University Park Campus. Dr Sarah Holland used images and documents from the University of Nottingham’s Manuscripts and Special Collections in a walk to explore the hidden histories still evident in the landscape and uncover some of the fascinating stories of people who lived and worked there over the last two centuries
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